The new Swarm
by DEATHxCHAN
Summary: Three friends stumble upon a Larva, which came from an asteroid. They help the Larva morphing into a Drone and finally a Hatchery and in exchange Laura becomes the Queen of Blades. She, Jake and Raymond then take it on to make earth a better place, before traveling through space. Easier said than done. [Rating may change to M]
1. Chapter 1

_**The fallen star**_

"Crap."

Jake, a 20 year old guy 1.80m tall, who has short black hair, normal skin, blue eyes, wearing his favorite blue vest and comfortable black trousers sighed as he took off his earphones.

Today was not his day, as he lost yet another Starcraft game. Out of ten games he lost eight. Deciding he totally needed a break, because he could swear all his opponents today were Korean players, he shut off the program and set his PC into standby mode.

It was a nice warm midsummer evening and he had spent already most of the day inside, so he decided he might as well get out a bit. He put on his sport shoes and got out of the house. Inhaling deeply the fresh air, he made his way towards a bunch of discounters. During the past few years one after another started covering the area, making it easier for people who didn't directly live in downtown.

Arriving in one of the stores, Jake immediately got himself milk and coke. (A/N: I know it hurts drinking both stuff at the same time, but it's good! I have issues).

He placed himself on a bench and just enjoyed the fresh evening air. Looking into the sky he thought about how much of hypocrite humanity is. There were good people out there, but most of them were suppressed by the ones with power.

Democracy was good and all, but it was slow. Giving one person the whole power however was always a bad idea. The people who could handle the power properly always didn't want it.

Incidentally he thought about the story of the video game he played just 20 minutes ago, Starcraft. He owned the one or other book about the game, providing some nice background story and side plots.

Terrans, well there's first a corrupt government, another corrupt government following the first, then Kel Moria which is yet another corrupt government and Umoja. From the little information he had, this government was actually okay, just not as big as the Dominion.

Then there were the protoss. Well, not the worst dudes, but still the government did want to kill the dark templers and not only banish them. Plus more than a bunch were stuck up, fanatic jerks who drug their own kind to serve a false god.

Finally the Zerg. Not much of a government there, because they're working in a hive mind. That's how they were born, well mostly. The primal Zerg ruled after the strongest is the boss. Actually he could find nothing against the Zerg, since they acted the most...natural. It was their nature to conquer, devour, assimilate and grow.

"Man, I need a second hobby." he sighed.

Just as he was about to get up from the bench, he saw something in the sky. At first he thought it was just a plane flying low, which happened regularly, since the next airport was just 50 km away. But on a second glance he saw that thing was far from being a plane. It was a ball of fire! An asteroid he realized and panicked instantly.

The ball of fire flew above him and headed straight for the hills. "What the fuck?" he asked and wondered if he had been seeing things. He was proven wrong when there was a loud explosion behind the hill, which temporary cost him his hearing. The ground shook and even some windows got broken.

People covered the area, wondering what exactly happened.

"Gotta check this out." Jake said to himself and headed towards the hills, his drinks completely forgotten. A few people started following him.

XIII

**Ground Zero**

"Holy macaroni!" Jake exclaimed as he saw the crater the meteoroid created. The grass was burned the trees were bent over by the shockwave, broken as if they were chopsticks. It didn't take long for cars to arrive at the area.

Jake was already halfway in the crater, when he saw something. There was a hole in the middle. He worked his way through the burned woodland and sure enough there was a hole there. He couldn't see how deep it went, but sure enough that rock got the record for drilling a hole that deep as the fastest.

Jake kneeled down and tried to make out some things. He used his phone as a flashlight, but didn't see much. A few other people gathered around him. "Anyone got a flashlight?" he asked.

"No." A man kneeled down. "What happened? Sounded like a bomb went off."

"Meteorite. Wish I had a camera." Jake replied.

More people arrived and the general 'cool', 'awesome' and so on talk started. Jake circled the hole a little more, dirt falling inside from his movements.

"Jake!" A voice called him. Looking up he saw his two Starcraft buddies Laura and Raymond coming down to him. Laura was a 1.86m tall girl, with red hair, green eyes, who wore a single red top, short blue jeans and black shoes.

Raymond had brown hair, which covered one of his eyes, brown eyes, his skin brown from his recent trip to the Caribbean's, he wore a turquoise polo shirt, brown trousers and grey shoes.

"What happened here man? Did you eat beans again?" Laura asked, snickering.

"Oh man dude. We told you to consult a doctor about this." Raymond or Ray for short added.

"I just can't help it I guess." Jake played along and all of them snickered. Then the three of them looked down the hole.

"How deep do you think this goes?" Laura asked after a while. Reporters and police started arriving at the scene. Ray and Jake both shrugged. "I don't think they'd let us be around for long, huh?" Raymond remarked as he saw the police coming down.

"Well at least something is happening around these parts without getting anyone killed." Jake thought about his neighbor who committed suicide the other week.

"Hmm..." Laura took out a small flashlight from her pocket.

"Why do you have that thing?" Jake asked. "Just bought it today." she replied. Even with the small flashlight, they couldn't see the ground. However they could see that it was rather spacious.

"Wow, look at this, guys." Laura exclaimed amazed by what she saw.

"Why's there a cave?" Ray asked. Laura put her flashlight away, seeing as it was no help in seeing anything. "Wait second, guys." Jake held out his arms. "If there is a cave under us" he pointed with his two pointer fingers down "and we're standing on the weakest spot right now..."

He couldn't say any more, since the ground collapsed under the three friends and with screams they fell down.

XIII

**Cave**

...

...

...

"Urgh..." multiple groans could be heard as the three friends slowly regained consciousness. "Guys?" Laura called out to the darkness, being the first one to recover. Under her exposed skin, she could feel that she was lying on a pile of earth. "Ray? Jake?"

"Yeah...?" the two answered almost simultaneously.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, soft landing. Ray?"

"Same here. Landed on a pile of dirt. Laura?"

"I could need a shower." the girl replied.

"Really? We fell down a cave and a shower is your biggest concern?" Jake asked into the darkness.

"How deep did we fell?" Raymond asked looking up. "I can't see the hole we came in through."

"Wait a minute..." Laura searched through her pockets and sighed in relief when she found her flashlight. The sudden light surprised the two boys. "What would you do without me?" Laura flashed around a little bit, blinding both of her friends in the process. She flashed around a little more and found out that the cave went a little deeper. Making a mental note, she flashed behind herself and found out why they couldn't see the exit.

"Looks like a slide. Climbing back won't be possible." she explained.

"So we have to wait for help." Ray concluded. Laura flashed back to her front. "How about we explore this thing a little bit more?" she asked.

"Are you nuts? We should wait for help." Jake exclaimed. "Not to mention we don't know if there's enough oxygen for us in there." Raymond pointed out.

Laura slowly got up and stumbled off the pile of earth she'd been laying on, her flashlight pointed to the ground. "Well, I'm going."

"Okay, okay, I'm coming. Just...gimme...a second." He grunted as he slowly got up and stumbled towards his friend. Raymond let out a sigh and got up himself.

"Stay close. I don't want any of us getting lost or fall even deeper." the brown haired male advised. Laura was now skin to skin contact with her two friends, but she didn't mind. It was best to stay close and when you can't see a thing, skin to skin contact was necessary.

"Shouldn't the meteoroid be nearby?" she asked.

"Well that thing got down sideways..." Jake pointed out.

Raymond disagreed. "Even if, something is wrong. It should have been right in front of us. Of course there's a possibility it got shred into a thousand pieces, although I'm no expert on that matter."

"That hole was pretty small now that I think about it." Jake said.

"Of course. That must be it. The stone landed and afterwards the hole opened. It must have rolled down, meaning we should-"

"Jackpot!" Laura cheered as her flashlight revealed a black stone, like it was burnt. It had the size of a football and a little bit of steam was coming out of it.

"Damn." Jake took out his phone and made some pictures. His friends copied him and soon you could hear the click sounds of cameras everywhere. "Looks like the cave goes even deeper." Laura examined with her light.

"We're not going any deeper." Raymond chided. "We found what we were looking for. Now let's go back, so that they actually can find and save us."

"Aww..." Laura pouted like a child, but knew it better. They were surrounded by earth, not rocks. The thing might collapse any second and breathing became harder with every second they spent there. Something wet, probably wet earth, already fell on her head, indicating the cave really could collapse any second.

Standing together the three friends turned around and walked back. Breathing became easier as they came closer to the exit.

"So and now?" Laura asked.

"Well...I got Risk installed on my phone." Raymond offered.

XIII

**Ground Zero**

"Phew." Raymond had been the last one in being brought out of the ground. He dusted of his pants and rubbed a part of the dirt off from his arms. He found himself in an uncomfortable situation as the reporters approached them and started asking him all kind of questions.

"Fuck you guys, I'm gonna take a shower." Laura showed them both middle fingers in an X shape, grinning into the camera and left. He and Jake burst out into a full laughter after seeing this and needed to support themselves on their legs.

"Anyways, I'm out too. Hey Ray, game later?"

"Yeah, later."

Jake forced his way through the reporters, ignoring the complaints of the ambulance people.

Raymond at least let himself check up and after it was established that he only had some scratches and bruises, he was free to go. Of course that meant facing off the press people. Being the most polite one out of the trio he decided to answer some of the questions.

"Yeah, so actually Laura and I walked up to my friend to inspect the hole. The ground...collapsed all of the sudden and then...we woke up in a cave."

He took out his cell phone and showed the photos he made to the press. "We think we found the meteoroid and decided to take some pictures. And the rest of the time we did nothing more than playing games on our phones.

Now, if you'd excuse me, but I could need a shower too."

Raymond didn't know how those reporters came up with even more questions, but he sure wouldn't answer anymore questions today. He was tired and needed a good game to calm the nerves after what happened today. If he was lucky he'd be able to catch the last bus to downtown.

That reminded him that he may be able to catch up with Laura who needed to take a ride too. Not as far as downtown, but still it would be more comfortable than 15 to 20 minutes walking. As it turned out the next evening Laura had taken a taxi.

XIII

**Laura's apartment**

Laura let out a sigh of relief when she finally was at home. The day had been exciting with the comet hitting earth and the cave, but waiting for hours to be saved sucked. At least no one got injured, so it was all in good fun.

Taking off her shoes, she immediately headed for the bathroom. She didn't have a big apartment, being a university student and financing everything from what her parents and other relatives saved up and what she earned from her job.

When she got rid of her clothes, she didn't notice that something that had been hanging on her back and hidden behind her muddy hair decided to let go off her and landed on the ground with a small thud. After taking her clothes off, she stepped into the shower, the warm water pouring down her dirty skin.

She enjoyed standing in the warm water for a little while before starting the tedious work of getting her hair clean. Long hair looked nice and all, but cleaning it up always took a while.

In the meantime her uninvited guest crawled towards the door of the bathroom, only to find it locked. Processing this new information, the tiny thing crawled into a corner, where it could hide behind a small shelf filled with towels. The thing learned that day that woman certainly take their time in order to get cleaned up.

_Meh, am not in the mood for a game. Yeah, pizza, a cold drink and a good movie will do the trick now. _Laura thought to herself as she stepped out of the bathroom with only a towel around her body.

"Where do I have...there we go. Why did I leave it here anyway?" Laura put on her bathrobe, instead of the towel and simply slumped down on the couch, only to remember she still needed to put the pizza in the oven.

Next she slammed herself on the couch, only to remember she still needed to put a DVD inside. "Oh, fuck it. Let's see what's on TV today." She picked up her the remote and hit the button. The Simpsons were on air and she could live with that, even if it was a modern episode.

Fifteen minutes later the smell of her pizza caught her attention. Grumbling she got up and took it out of the oven. She immediately returned, not even bothering cutting the thing. She just took a bite and put the plate down on the table.

She didn't notice her 'guest' crawling on the floor towards the kitchen. It needed nutrients and that fast. The meal the female terran made for herself was out of question, as well as the female terran herself. It had plans with said terran and it would be best to not get on her bad side.

It crawled under the table, desperately gathering all the crumbs it could find and made a little pile. Just as it wanted to start eating the pile there was a sudden gasp. Looking to the side, the small visitor found the owner of the apartment standing at the doorframe.

Laura's eyes were wide as she stared at the thing on the ground. "A larva?" she whispered. She closed her eyes, counted to three and opened them again. Next she pinched herself in the arm and looked up again.

"You're real? Or did I hit my head today?" she asked herself. As the larva didn't disappear from her vision, she kneeled down and carefully stretched out her arm towards it. The larva looked at the hand as it came closer and closer until it touched its head. Laura's eyes widened even more when she could actually feel the larva.

Her eyes drifted off to the small pile of crumbs next to the larva. "You're hungry, aren't you?" The red head realized. To her surprise the larva nodded. "Okay." She got up on her feet. "I'm either delusional or shit just got real. And in case I'm not delusional I'm about to do something really stupid."

She walked over to her fridge and took out some meat and placed it on a table. The larva watched her with interest as she took out a plate and a knife. With the knife she opened the plastic bag and then placed the meat on the table.

Some disturbing motherly instincts took over and Laura gently grabbed the larva and placed it on the table. "Uhh, should I heat it up?" To answer her question the larva devoured the meat within seconds, reminding Laura of the one mission in Heart of the Swarm, where you start as a Larva.

"Wow." Laura commented. The plate was clean, even the sauce was gone. Curiosity taking over Laura placed herself on a chair and placed her head on the table right in front of the larva.

"Hard to imagine you can transform into an Ultralisk and smash me with no effort whatsoever. Don't you little things need creep to survive?" she asked, slowly stroking the little thing over its back. The larva didn't object, on the contrary it seemed to enjoy it. "What am I going to do with you? Can you transform into a Drone?"

The little thing nodded. Laura raised an eyebrow. "Could you transform into a Hatchery afterwards?" The larva pointed at the empty meat package.

"Right. I don't think I have enough to replace 300 amounts of minerals. Not to mention we don't have that stuff here on earth. And we don't have vespene gas either."

It didn't seem to worry the larva. Laura looked up thinking. "I hope they'll play along."

XIII

**In front of Laura's house**

Jake drove up with his car, Raymond sitting on the side. Both seemed a little confused as to why Laura called them both to her apartment in the middle of the night. Luckily they had vacation and none of them needed to attend their jobs the next day.

"Alright, what's so...'important'?" Jake asked a little annoyed. Ray chuckled. "He lost. So what's up?"

"Upstairs." Both noted that Laura was unusual tense. They followed her into the apartment and into the kitchen.

"What the fuck?!" Both exclaimed, seeing something they shouldn't be seeing, because it was not real. At least not supposed to be real. It crept both even more out, when Laura let the larva climbing up her arm and onto her shoulder.

"You're not serious..." Ray began, but knew the answer already. Jake rubbed his temples. "That thing was in the meteoroid?" he asked.

"I guess." Laura shrugged. "I did feel something on my head one time, but I didn't think of it too much."

"I'm not gonna question why you didn't suspect anything." Jake looked directly into his friend's eyes. "I'm not even going to ask the why, the how and the where. I'm going to ask the are! Are you sure? Do you know what just might happen if everything gets out of control?"

"I think it is already out of control." Raymond remarked. "Did that thing infest you?" he was himself surprised as to how calm he was about this.

"Nah, it didn't. And yeah, I'm sure about this."

...

...

...

"Why the hell am I tempted to help you, instead of killing that thing?" Jake asked in all honesty. Raymond sweatdropped, although he had to admit this was just too good of an opportunity to let it slip. He himself was Protoss player and Jake a Terran player, while Laura was the Zerg player.

Maybe it was only the opportunity, maybe it was the chance to someday meet a real Protoss or to just travel into space, whatever it was, in the end he said. "I can't belief I'm saying this, but...I'm in."

There was a silence between the three as everyone awaited Jake's answer.

"I'm not in the mood to get ripped apart by some oversized insects. I'm in." Wherever that logic came from. Laura let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding.

"Thanks guys, you're the best."

"What are friends for?" Raymond asked.

"Money? Sex? Not being the lonesome emo?" Despite it being not really funny all three laughed at Jake's words.

The three called it a night.

XIII

Raymond and Laura were alone in Laura's apartment, watching the Larva curiously as it seemed to sleep on Laura's lap. Jake was out with the money from all of them, buying meat for the little thing.

The red haired girl slowly stroke over the little thing's back. Said larva had spent the night with the girl on a side note. On the news Raymond's interview could be seen along with videos of the meteoroid that civilians had taken.

The larva itself seemed to be pretty interested in the television. The doorbell rang soon enough. Laura put the larva on her shoulder and walked over to the door.

"Barbeque!" Jake announced as he entered the apartment with two sacks full of meat.

"Still can't belief we're actually doing this." He continued as he placed himself on the couch, while Laura already fed the larva in the kitchen.

"You think she's infested?" Jake asked Raymond in a low tone. In response Ray held up his arms and let them land on his lap, signalizing he didn't know. "We can only wait and see, but considering we're trying to give birth to an entire brood, we already doomed humanity." He looked out of the window. "It's true what they say about us gamers. We're all ready for the asylum."

"It's my second home already." Jake retorted, trying to ignore the sounds of flesh being ripped apart coming from the kitchen. Raymond focused on the weather for the time being.

15 minutes later Laura came out of the kitchen with the Larva on her shoulder.

"Alright, we're ready to go to create our own swar."

"You sure we don't end up dead, after the first Zergling is born?" Jake asked.

"That just adds the thrill!"

Raymond and Jake sighed. If it wasn't a one in a lifetime opportunity, they would seriously reconsider if not kill the Larva.

"Okay, since we're doing this, where are we doing this?" Ray asked. "Huh?" Laura looked at him confused.

"We need a place where definitely no one would go to under normal circumstances. A place that is hidden well enough, so no one stumbles accidently over the hatchery." he elaborated further.

"Oh..." Laura dropped her head in realization.

"The caves from yesterday won't go..." Jake mused, his hand under his chin. He looked to the side on the couch and thought about all the places around town.

"I got it." He suddenly said, taking out his keys. "No shitting or pissing in my car. And also no creep, got it?" he asked the Larva, which nodded in response. With a raised eyebrow everyone left the apartment.

Inwardly the Larva was excited. Soon the swarm would be reborn and soon the swarm would have a new leader. The Larva looked at Laura as those thoughts crossed its mind. Or rather minds.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Rebirth**_

**The hills**

"Where're we going anyway?" asked Laura who was seated in the back, the Larva resting on her lap. "Well the good news is, the place I have in mind is somewhere in nowhere. The bad thing, it is an half an hour ride through the hills and through various villages for that matter."

"Couldn't we just take the train?" Raymond asked who was placed next to Jack.

"Nope, no train whatsoever. Bus station yeah, but you'd still have to walk there for 45 minutes. A few people wander there every now and then, but mostly only during the summer. The rest of the time we should be for ourselves."

"Okay, then how do you know so much about this place, if it is so safe?" Laura questioned. "My mom's friend lives in the next best village of the place we're heading. She and my mom forced me and the son of my mom's friend to wander with them when we were children. Finally comes in handy."

XIII

**Apparently somewhere...it's a forest with no name, 'kay?**

Jake drove off from the road and parked the car next to a small lake. "The middle of nowhere. Next stop: some cave." Jake got out of the car and the rest followed. So far for his two friends it looked like a forest you could find anywhere in the middle of Europe. Nothing really stood out and the road was a ten minute walk away.

Someone dropped a metal barrel in the lake and it looked like it has been in there for quite some time. "The thing is still there? Lol." Jake shook his head, smiling nostalgically. The Larva seemed to inhale the fresh air and looked around its new home.

"Okay man, where to?" Raymond asked. Jake pointed towards a way, which leads upwards. "We're going to walk for a while." he explained. He opened the trunk of his car and took out three bottles of water and three flashlights (the flashlights had been prepared in advance). "Luckily I forgot to take them out. Alright let's go."

Jake lead the way and the other two followed. By now Laura had long lost her fear of the Larva and even Raymond started petting the little thing. Jake in the meanwhile focused on the way ahead and tried to remember which path would bring them towards the place he had in mind. It was tricky for him to remember because the place had changed a little everywhere and the only signs he could use was the path they walked on.

Whether they walked left or right, how bright the path itself was, if it got up a little or down.

He sighed in relief when they finally found the small river. He noticed they had taken a little detour. As a kid he walked a part of the way off the path and took some shortcuts.

Laura gave the Larva some water from her bottle and giggled as she saw how much difficulty the Larva had when trying to drink the water. "What do you think happened causing the Larva to take a ride on an asteroid?" Raymond ask as he was carefully avoiding the deeper parts of the small current in order to keep his socks dry.

"Hard to imagine the Zerg actually got defeated." Jake made his statement and more enjoyed the view of everything. "Maybe it's the last one of its brood?" Laura suggested looking at the thing like it was an injured animal that needed attention.

"It could be that the last battle against Amon already happened. This would certainly support both theories." He mused.

"Uh, kind of no?" Jake intervened. "Remember? Starcraft 2 starts at the year of 2504. That is a little bit in the future, you know? Unless of course either time travel or alternate dimension." Jake was a fan of the multiverse theory, mainly because you can make so many great jokes with it or just talk bullshit.

"Good point. Then what if something not canon happened? Like the protoss won somehow against the Zerg?"

"Hey little guy." Jake called out the Larva. "Can't you just communicate with us via mind to mind contact?" he asked. The little thing shook its head. "Too bad."

"I bet it would have if it could." Laura said and cuddled with the little thing, creeping the other two out.

"Whatever brought the Larva here, let's hope it wasn't something hostile and decides to look around and find the earth." Raymond stated sternly. "My vote goes to Protoss. You know, maybe this whole blowing up the planets thing worked out in the end." Jake said.

"As crazy as it sounds..." Laura began, but made a little pause before continuing "I think this thing here comes from the Starcraft universe and somehow got transported into our dimension."

Raymond thought about his answer a little more. "I think here's some kind of third party involved. Dunno how and why, but I think that's how it is."

Jake suddenly stopped in his tracks and looked around.

"What's up?" Laura asked. Jake drank some water out of his bottle before speaking up. "Nothing. I'm just trying to remember which the easier way up was up."

He was looking up a hill with multiple trees they would have to use to support themselves in order to climb up. Then there was the way that went through a lot of bushes. On both ways he had the one or other accident as a kid because of his own stupor.

He decided for the left way with the trees because it was the faster one. His two friends followed him, careful not to slip up on the moos or loose leaves. "Hey Jake, are you sure this place even exists?" Laura asked.

"We're almost there." he called back.

It took them about 5 more minutes until they finally reached some kind of overview point. Raymond and Laura wowed at seeing what was on the overview point.

"That's the way I reacted the first time I was here." Jake said as the three stood in front of a cave. The light from outside revealed about 1/3 of it. The ceiling was pretty high, but luckily the rock was hard enough so it wouldn't collapse.

Jake luckily advised his friends to bring flashlights with them, stronger ones. Jake finished his water and flinched at the thought of going back without additional water supply. "I always wanted to throw a barbeque party here, but...last time I was here there was a bear in this cave." he gulped at the memory. "Not nice, I can tell you."

The other two laughed and wanted to press for details, if not for the Larva jumping off Laura's shoulder and crawling into the middle of the three. All humans looked at the thing curiously as it curled up into a ball and something began to grow out of it.

All of them let out sounds of surprise and awe, when within seconds a complete green cocoon formed around the Larva, looking like a Zerg egg from the game. It pulsed and with every 'breath' it was glowing green.

"Awesome..." Laura whispered.

"How long do you think it will take?" Raymond asked, not removing his eyes from the egg.

"In the game a worker in every race takes 17 seconds to spawn." Jake looked at his watch. "17 seconds already passed. This might take a while."

All of them placed themselves on the ground, keeping their gazes on the egg, which slowly grew. After five more minutes they started making bets on how long it would take for the Drone to spawn. Only 15 minutes in total passed when suddenly the egg exploded and a drone came out of the egg. It had the size of a full grown German shepherd and with the 'wings' it was as wide as two of them.

Everyone gathered around the Drone in order to take a closer inspection. Laura held out her hand and carefully stroke with her fingers over the wings.

After a while the drone, uhhh...walked(?) (Seriously, do these guys walk or do they kind of fly or swim a little?) into the middle of the cave and started morphing. Violet fins seemed to come out of it and grew in size very quickly. When it stopped expanding, a little bit of creep appeared around the fleshy mass, which was closing in over the Drone.

The Hatchery had started morphing.

XIII

The Hatchery was only growing very slowly. In fact it was so slow, that the three humans had time to visit the next best village, eat in a small restaurant and come back with more supplies. The Hatchery or what would be soon a Hatchery was as wide as a hut. The violet light that came out of the cocoon was enough to illuminate the entire cave.

No one dared to touch the thing, so they were all just sitting in a safe distance and watching the thing slowly growing, sometimes catching a glimpse of the shadow of the Drone inside the Hatchery.

Slowly but steadily everyone was growing impatient and the sun started to set.

"Should we call it a day? I need to work tomorrow you know." Jake called out to his friends.

"What? Tomorrow is Sunday." Laura pointed out.

"I work at the bakery/café at the train station. We're opened even on Sundays. And I gotta be there early and for that I need the car, since the busses don't drive that early." He looked at his watch. "I already won't get much sleep, so-" He was interrupted by a sudden rumbling from the Hatchery.

Everyone's attention was now at the pile of flesh and moments later the Hatchery broke out of the 'cocoon'. It was as high as one third of the cave and in a matter of seconds the three found themselves surrounded by creep.

Laura, Raymond and Jake stared at the command structure of the Zerg, their jaws dropped. Laura was the first one to recover and slowly approached the building, making sounds with each step she took, due to the creep on the ground.

Three small Larvas already spawned out of the building and were lying in front of it, each watching one of the humans. They made Laura some space when she was in front of the Hatchery and touched it.

"Feels warm." she commented. The building all of the sudden trembled a little and something came out of it from the ground. She took a few steps back from the thing that came out. Everyone gathered around the strange object.

"Looks like it is something to step into." Raymond observed.

"Is it just me or does that thing look like the downer part of one of those Zerg cocoons?" Jake asked. "Any volunteers?" he added after a few seconds of silence.

No one made a move for the next couple of minutes.

"You guys know what? YOLO!" Laura cheered.

"Wait!" he two friends shouted. "You do know there's no going back afterwards?" Jake pointed out. "Plus we don't know if you'll be still yourself." Raymond asked worried. Laura shrugged in response.

"Don't worry guys. It takes a lot more than a simple virus to change my personality completely. Besides, I can't leave the lead of the swarm to two Zerg noobs." she grinned although she was a bit exaggerating. Jake was at least good enough to play the Zerg campaign on highest difficulty, but that was actually it. Raymond was a little better than Jake with Zerg, but far from being a pro player.

Before any of her two friends could react, Laura stepped inside the thing and immediately afterwards a cocoon started to grow around her. She barely managed to stand still, being overall excited.

After the cocoon closed Raymond and Jake stood there dumbfounded. Someone Laura's confidence had been big enough to stop the two from intervening and now it was too late. The two looked at each other and then worriedly over to the cocoon.

The Larvas gathered around the cocoon, somehow being drawn to it.

"All or nothing." Raymond sighed.

"Kerrigan's transformation took a few weeks." Jake stated as a matter of fact, trying to keep calm. "We might as well go back." Raymond nodded solemnly. "When does your shift ends?"

"Around nine. Luckily short day.

...

What are we going to say if someone asks us where she is?"

"Let's worry about that later. I'm too tired to properly think. Let's go back and get some rest."

XIII

Shortly after the cocoon closed, Laura couldn't hear anything from outside anymore. She couldn't see anything, but feel how something connected to her exposed body parts. It tickled a little and she had to admit it was a little disturbing as to how she could feel the Zerg stuff going under her skin.

A few minutes later all of the sudden some kind of warm liquid started filling the cocoon. She could feel how her shoes started to disappear all of the sudden. Well Zerg had no use for clothes anyway.

She was afraid that she would drown until she remembered that the cocoon would most likely give her the oxygen she needed. Speaking off, she wondered if she could survive in space after the transformation. How did the Zerg survive in space anyway? Maybe she would get the answers later.

The liquid covered now her legs and she felt something stirring inside them. It was almost as if they were melting from the inside. She realized the virus was already starting to work. She hoped she wouldn't feel much pain.

Just as these thoughts left her mind she felt sleepy all of the sudden. Almost against her own will she curled up like a fetus and closed her eyes. Her lasts thoughts were that this whole situation was just awesome, before she fell asleep.

XIII

**Main train station**

Jake didn't get any sleep that night and arrived at his workplace half an hour before he had to be at his workplace. Thing was, the door was still closed and needed to be opened by one of his seniors. The station itself would open 45 minutes later, the time he and his co-workers had to prepare the basic stuff.

He drank his third coke f the night, hoping the sugar and caffeine would keep him awake. He would have never guessed that he would ever worry so much about someone in his life. Well you learn something new every day.

His hometown mostly got its money from tourism and there was a high chance people from all around would just come to see the place the comet made contact with earth.

His co-workers arrived on spot and opened the door. Working at the bakery meant one thing: all of your co-workers are women. There was one time another man was working with him, but the dude only made some practical training for a week.

The result of all of this was, his co-workers every now and then teasing him as to why he didn't have a girlfriend or giving him some unwanted tips. Truth to be told he couldn't see himself in any kind of relationship, because he thought no girl would be happy with him.

Raymond had had some girlfriends in his life, but nothing lasted. Even Ray tried to give Jake some tips, but so far he didn't fell like having a girlfriend. He had a crush every now and then on a girl, but suspected it were only his hormones reacting. So far he had been proven right.

Work was as boring as ever and Jake was as slow as always. The reason people liked him at his workplace was not because he was a fast worker, but rather that he did things right and was reliable. He always stepped in for others who got sick and never has been late so far, except for one or two minutes sometimes.

Today was like any other weekend day. The drunken people laughed over stuff that wasn't funny and for some reason were the most patient customers. Luckily his senior declared Jake would be at the cashbox next to the coffee today, meaning no annoying sandwich making.

It was six, when Raymond appeared at the counter, the lack of sleep obvious in his eyes. "'Sup? Coffee?" Jake asked. Raymond just nodded before yawning. "Sorry, I couldn't sleep."

"Yeah, same here." Jake replied before handing over the coffee. "Anything else?"

"Maybe later."

"1.90."

Ray took out his purse. "I thought I might as well wait here until your shift ends."

"Just don't fall asleep or I'll have to kick you out. Speaking off..." Jake sighed looking over to the tables. He then checked the counter and saw there were no other customers. His co-worker would be good alone for one or two minutes.

"Wish I could throw those people out, like they do in the disco."

XIII

**Swarm Cluster**

Laura was asleep, she knew that much. But she could feel things. She could feel the Larva in front of the cocoon, the Hatchery behind her and everything the creep touched. It was a completely new feeling for her. Her mind felt strong and with every passing minute it grew stronger.

She experimented a little, touching the creep with her mind, feeling every cell working. She got bored pretty fast and let her mind wander a bit. For some reason she couldn't feel anything outside the small hive, most likely because she was still changing.

After some more experimenting she found out how to look through the eyes of one of her Larva. Something appeared in her mind, information about into what she could order the larva to transform.

At first she didn't get the gist of it, but then it changed inside her mind, showing her the same HUD she was used to from playing Starcraft 2, with more additional options. Of course there wasn't a mini map or anything, that would have been too nice. Maybe it would work with several Overlords in orbit.

Speaking off, the information shown to her told her that she needed an Overlord in order to even start spawning Drones. Another piece of information showed her that there was just enough bio mass there for her to create one Overlord and five Drones afterwards. Almost starting options. Only the 50 minerals were missing.

In exchange of course there was herself. She grinned inwardly wondering just how strong she would be after the transformation was done. A thought crossed her mind. Instead of building five Drones, she could build one Drone and one Spawning Pool.

But then again she had no idea as to how she would be able to use the Drones. There were no resources to harvest. After these thoughts crossed her mind, seemingly out of nowhere information popped up. It was like the picture of a Drone had been selected and detailed information was shown to her.

Drones were workers, but they didn't only harvest resources. They were able to create underground tunnels and make the cave they were in even bigger. Drones could be considered small building engineers. They could figure out where to dig and were to create rather fleshy supports in order to prevent the cave from collapsing.

After over viewing the info she got, Laura mentally ordered the two Larvas to turn into Drones and one to turn into an Overlord. She herself was already more than strong enough to keep the connection to two Drones. Seeing as this would take fifteen minutes (Overlord 22), Laura experimented a little bit, 'looking around' her HUD and finding something that looked like a DNA-helix. She couldn't remove anything, but there seemed to be some free spots. Upgrades? Or maybe something the swarm had to get from another life form.

The thing was there weren't many interesting things on earth. Maybe around the tropic parts of Earth, but else? Well there were the wolves with their very good hearing or toxic creatures that basically lived all around earth. And of course the plant life.

There was a lot to explore and it would take some time, but of course there was also the thing with the other humans. Jake ones told her that there was an old US-Airforce base 25 km away and still operational. Apparently Jake drives that far in order to get a haircut. Jake was just weird sometimes, whether he did it on purpose or not. He also told her there were still soldiers despite the cold war being over.

Then there were the local barracks. The three of them had been there last year, when a few tanks and their functions had been shown to the public, without shooting targets mind you. It was not big, but the fact that it was there at all, meant the higher ups would be informed pretty fast of the Zerg.

It wouldn't matter whether Laura's personality would change after the transformation or not, humans were paranoid in general. And who could really blame them? Zerg might be cool in a computer game, but in real life they were frightening.

Laura would at least need a small army and steadily increase it, along with building up her base, which most likely will be an underground tunnel system and finally looking for sequences to improve her swarm.

Speaking of the base and the swarm, she wondered why she needed all those buildings in order to spawn new units. Turned out under the creep there was a huge connection with the roots, almost like the internet. It didn't stop at the creep, but it had limits to a certain 'map area' as Laura called it. There were two reasons the buildings were needed. For one they provided the information needed to create the new units, which was bullshit, but there wasn't much she could do. The second thing was: these buildings actually had purposes as living quarters, so she'd most likely build more than one for example Spire.

The three Drones were finished by now and she ordered two more to spawn. The other three initially got to work, having already heard the thoughts of their leader during the morph phase.

Supplies were a little problem, which could be easily solved. Drones were no hunters. They had means of self defense, but only if it had to be. She made a mental note to look into the matter, when she had more free time.

No additional bio mass had to come through her friends or herself. But as much as she was eager to test out her new skills once she was finished, she didn't want the authorities to know of her, when she didn't even had one fighter.

A thought crossed her mind. Once they discovered the tunnel network, which was being built at this very minute, they could always get the idea and blow things up. Defensive structures were a must be, but again supplies. If only Earth had minerals or vespene gas.

By the thought of the gas, information about the Extractor popped up. Sure it was mainly used for getting the green stuff, but it could also be used like drilling for other stuff. Mineral, underground water (not necessary but always welcome) other gas that might be used in on or another way. It was almost like plant life with some additions.

It didn't take much building that thing, but her resources were zero. Raymond's and Jake's purses would have to bleed for the swarm Laura realized.

She didn't know how much time passed already, but by now she could feel the world outside of the hive. And to her delight her two friends were just returning to the Hatchery. Well, Jake slipped up a little and rolled down the hill, taking Raymond with him. Laura would have laughed, but she couldn't move a muscle. In fact the only thing she could feel around her body was the warm bio-chemical liquid.

The Overlord already popped up and out of habit Laura wanted to send him scouting the area, but luckily she reminded herself that she needed to hide for now. But she knew already her patience wouldn't last long. Once the first Zerglings were out, she most likely wouldn't be able to withstand the temptation of going outside anymore. But for that matter her transformation needed to be completed. She wondered how long that would take and got the information inside her head: 9 more hours. Even she was surprised. Her entire transformation took her only 24 hours.


	3. Chapter 3

_**Rise of a queen**_

**Hive Cluster**

Raymon and Jake didn't expect to find an active Zerg base inside the cave. Much more surprising was the fact that the Hatchery illuminated the entire area in a violet light. It looked exactly like in the game, the colors being at the spots where they were in the game. The day before they had still been orange. Jake preferred blue, while Raymond's favorite color was green.

"What are they doing?" Jake pointed at the Drones working on the wall and transporting rocks away into a corner, where they got melted into some kind of mass by one of the Drones spitting on the stuff.

"Hmm, I guess when I want to renovate my home then I'll just need to ask Laura for some Drone helpers." Ray joked, nervously looking at the working Drones. His gaze fell onto the Overlord, which just looked at the visitors and floated at the ceiling. "It's almost as if the creep is breathing." Raymon noted absent minded. "As if this whole situation wasn't creepy enough. No pun intended." Jake added quickly. "When the government finds out about this, we'll be in trouble."

Jake snorted at that statement. "Who are they going to send, X-COM? Zerglings can bite through armor of Space Marines. Mutas can keep up with Protoss Phoenix and Terran Wraith. No jet on earth should be a problem. And Nukes? The explosion might kill a few thousand, but radiation does shit on Zerg with their regeneration ability."

"On them yes, but what about us humans?" Raymond asked. "If one government is ever pushed far enough to use nuclear weapons, the humans will get into the crossfire. Be it the actual explosion or the radiation." He stated as a matter of fact calmly, not showing his hidden worry.

"If humans who don't fight will be sparred that is." Both friends looked over to the big pulsing cocoon. Aside from growing bigger, there was no sign of any progress in Laura's transformation. There also was no sign of her personality having changed, since the Zerg weren't attacking. But Drones were not exactly known as fighters anyway. There was much more to discuss but without seeing the results of Laura's transformation it wouldn't bring them anywhere anyways. The toughest part would be anyway to show humanity that the Zerg were only there to correct some flaws, by three totally biased opinions mind you. Hey, no one's neutral, except he's a selfish jerk.

Raymond and Jake went outside and placed themselves outside the entrance. Ray had the opportunity of drinking beer, while Jake was restricted from alcohol, 'cause he needed to drive. During his driving lessons he had enough almost accidents and he wouldn't take any risks. So he took the next best stuff from beer: coke.

"You know, we probably won't have to fear X-COM, but more likely Zerg-hater-Korean-players." Jake and Raymond laughed. The brown haired young man thought about this statement. "I've heard the US-government is checking the scores of CoD, Battlefield and whatnot players, because they're working on those robots going into a fight."

"Video game players? Are they nuts? Just imagine: a rocket noob user." the black haired young man remembered the times he played CoD.

"Can I have mine in stormtrooper skin?" Ray mimicked the stereotypical nerd.

"You know how they're going to pay them? Free WoW accounts."

"And junk food."

"Junk food."

"Cheers." Both raised their drinks and emptied their bottle and can.

Hours passed with them doing nothing more than talking about funny rumors, which were mostly about different militaries of certain countries. The failed rocket launch of North Korea was their latest laugh, when they started eating their lunch. Jake made a few self-made sandwiches back at his workplace. He was actually only allowed to eat one thing free for the entire work day, which technically includes 1 kilogram bread. But his boss broke that rule more than one time herself. Everyone broke that rule.

A few more hours past, every twenty minutes they checked on the cocoon from the inside. Ten minutes after they last checked both felt something tugging their shirts. Turning around with their heads, they found one of the Drones standing behind them and pointing towards the cave. Both humans looked at each other, thinking the same thing: _Here it goes._

The two followed the Drone inside the cave. The cocoon was rumbling violently. Instinctively the two took a few steps back. It didn't take long until Laura freed herself from the cocoon releasing an invisible wave of psionic energy knocking her two friends out. Later they would say, their brains felt like they'd been turned into liquid, sucked up by a black hole and danced a tango with a Hydralisk.

Laura looked down at her new body. It looked exactly like the body of the queen of blades. She could feel her skeleton like wings on her back, the creep under her feet (with the high heel feature?) and most importantly she felt like she could flick over a mountain.

With her claw like finger she went over the scales on her body. They weren't exactly thick or anything, but felt harder than metal. It felt like she could now withstand an explosion. Speaking of explosions, how the hell could she activate her new psi abilities and moreover, what kind of abilities did were inside her? She couldn't wait to unleash a small apocalypse upon her enemies.

The familiar picture of the HUD appeared inside her mind. It showed her body, along with her DNA strains. There were a few strains which looked a lot different from the others, but in general were still Zerg. She asked for an explanation inside her mind and was almost shocked when the information appeared in her mind: these were primal Zerg strains! Were the hell did they come from?!

_Only one way to find out._

Laura could feel the hive. She had all the memories of each Zerg that ever lived. In theory she only needed to implant the memories of a veteran Zergling into a larva before allowing her to transform and wham: you had Rambo.

Speaking of memories, the hive couldn't give her a straight answer. It couldn't give her an answer at all, which unnaturally pissed her off for some reason. Sensing her anger the hive gave her a quick answer: to put it simple, the memory was 'corrupted' like a safe file of a computer program, when you shut down during saving.

Aside from some blurry images of the space, including a few large objects and some noise, there was nothing she could make out.

_Like a trauma. _She thought. It looked like the Zerg REALLY got defeated somehow. She tipped on some kind of psi-weapon.

Satisfied with the explanation, Laura returned to reality. Her body functions and possible improvements could wake. She found her two friends knocked out on the ground, with psi energy around them (invisible for the human eye). Almost on auto pilot, she kneeled down and put her hands on her friends' foreheads. Before she could think on her own, a Terran Starcraft menu opened up inside her mind, showing her the two brains of her friends. Their cells were reorganizing themselves, following a certain patters.

A memory from a (now dead) infested Terran scientist showed her that she accidentally unlocked psi abilities inside her friends' minds. The two were becoming ghosts or spectres. All of them liked Tosh more than Nova.

Seeing as her friends were out cold for who know how long, Laura found herself with a problem. She couldn't bring them into hospital, without causing a panic, probably worldwide. Well, every single Starcraft fan would be alarmed. Thinking about a way to bring them to the hospital without anyone noticing her, like placing them on a nearby street, an information popped up in her head: a Queen would be able to help. A Queen was able to interact with the Hatchery and used some of it functions Laura had no idea they existed.

Basically Laura could do it too, but she was inexperienced. Genes included a lot of complex chemicals, not to mention DNA-strains were more sensitive than a newborn. One wrong move and she would kill her friends.

Right, originally she planned on having her friends bringing her some, okay a lot of meat to her from the shops, but that plan was ruined. Her Drones weren't exactly hunters. Using her Overlord to overview the area was way too risky, thanks to modern technology. Planes, balloons, satellites, for each of those things she could find reasons to take pictures.

In the end it meant she would have to go hunting herself, but there were multiple problems with that idea. First, she was a city girl. The only things she knew about nature, were some facts she learned in school that wouldn't help her at all. Here and there a few things from TV, but that was it. She couldn't read tracks or anything. This led her to the next problem.

She wasn't a skilled hunter or assassin. This wasn't Starcraft, where the neutral units just sat around at their designed places on the map, waiting to be eliminated by one of the two fractions. She would need to sneak up, eventually run after the animal she was chasing. Oh, speaking of them...

There weren't exactly many in the area. At least she never saw many. This wasn't America. Half of the animals she could hunt were almost extinct. Those she could hunt she never saw on any trip she made around the area. Stags should live here, but the only ones she knew would be missed, because they lived in a park, where you can feed them.

Her last problem was she was the freaking Queen of Blades. Even none Starcraft players would freak out just by seeing her.

The time she thought about her problems, her Drones made it comfortable for her friends, leaning them against the Hatchery. Looking over to them, Laura made a decision. If they wouldn't wake up by sundown, she would go hunting herself and try to catch something. In the meantime, she might as well make it comfortable at her new home.

XIII

**The woods**

Despite the high heel things (again why?), Laura had no problems in running or climbing around. It was the opposite, she was now way more skilled in everything and didn't feel any exhaustion at all. She knew she was powerful and all, but that was something else. She briefly wondered if she could even sleep with all the energy inside her body.

She was currently running deeper into the large forest, away from where humans normally could go. She needed to climb around a little bit here and there, but that was no problem. Now that she was fully born, she had reached her entire psi-potential. Aside from everything her Zerg could see, she herself could close her eyes and focus over a huge area. She found out her body was still developing and when it was at its fullest, she would be able to give mental orders to planets more than just a few light-years away. She was able locate a herd of stags in some small distance.

Oh and there was an interesting discovery about the Hive. Apparently they were (more than a little) scandalized that their Queen was going on such a simple task as hunting, which was a pretty low task. Organizing supplies and all.

_Hello, Hive? I don't have any Zerglings and the Drones would only slow me down. Ever heard of the word efficiency? I know the swarm is all into going in, until the enemy is out of ammo, but right now WE are out of ammo. And Earth has not much to give!_

The Hive considered to her to absorb the humans and use their resources.

_You chose the wrong person for that kind of thing. We will absorb worlds, but NOT this one! Might as well be a good lesson for you. Seeing as how you did things, I can actually see as to how the swarm got defeated. Who was the last one leading the swarm?_

_The Overmind? What about Sarah Kerrigan? Does the name ring any bells?_

_..._

_Just how many years of the swarm's memory are missing? 3? Why? Oh yeah, no memory. Interesting. Looks like there's something strong out there. Whatever, at least the memories of the travel are still intact and using multiple wormholes was really smart. We'll go back to where you came from, when we have a lot and I mean A LOT of planets as a base to return. Remind me to check with the NASA, when we have our first Leviathan. They have a project going on, looking for other planets to live on._

Laura slowed down as she came near the location of the herd. They actually outside the forest, lying on a grass field, their ears twitching from every single noise. A predatory smile appeared on the queen's face.

This would be _fun._

She jumped farther than humanly possible, out of the bushes and her wing cut off the head of her first victim. It couldn't even scream. The noise itself startled the other animals, but before they could even get up, three more were dead. The remaining 8 now knew they were in danger and tried, emphasizing on TRIED, to run away.

Laura jumped again and ripped of the leg of the stag. She didn't pay the cries of the animal any heed and focused on getting the rest killed. For three of them, she actually used her psi-abilities, killing the animals by simply damaging their brains.

Animal thoughts were...weird. They weren't sharp, more a little clouded and rather simple. Of course the only thought those animals had been to run away. The four left had put some distance, but Laura could see in the darkness as good as in broad daylight. Within seconds she closed the distance between the first two and her and killed them.

The two left, Laura wanted to try something else. She couldn't shoot lightning out of her fingers, not yet anyway, but she had a similar attack to those of the Hydralisk. She pointed out her fingers and her hair did the same on its own. The next moment she shot spines towards the fleeing animals and it connected. They were only injured, but the toxin would kill them within the minute.

Nah, Laura wouldn't chase after them. It was summer, meaning it was not dark for long. She picked up the first two corpses and quickly headed back to the cave. It took her twenty minutes at full sprint. And hell she really enjoyed running like this without the need of taking a break. This was so not queen like and the hive had the nerve to remind her of that. In response she mentally strangled the entire Hive, shutting them up. She wasn't a natural tyrant or anything, but she felt the need to make clear that she was the one giving the shots now.

When she got back, Laura threw the corpses on the ground and ran back towards the site of the massacre. You couldn't put it any other way, really. A few more runs and Laura was finished with her work. She checked up on her friends with her newfound abilities, but couldn't find out when exactly they would wake up.

The humans on earth weren't really far evolved into using psi abilities. Despite it seemingly going well, Laura decided not to take any chances. The Drones were finished with bringing the meat into the Hatchery, so Laura picked out two and ordered them to become and Extractor and a Spawning Pool.

About the Extractor, you could build it everywhere, but there were good and bad places to put this thing. Better would be of course a place with as many resources as possible, such as a Vespene Geyser or near a Volcano. Without the thing spitting lava of course.

Laura didn't have the luxury to actually choose a position, so a corner of the cave had to do the trick. Doing her math, she registered she had enough to replace those two Drones immediately (the Queen already calculated) but stopped in that particular train of thought. It was either two Drones or four Zerglings. The Lings would be able to help her hunt, but she could also wait for the Extractor to give her the resources, which would take a while.

_Oh man! This is just the beginning and I already have to make difficult decisions? Cut me some slack here! No use complaining, I guess. Okay, what would you do in a game? No seriously, what would you do in a game against Terrans? Let's see here. They don't know where I am, they actually don't know that I exist at all, but they have better resources right now and can get ready for battle fast when they discover your base. However, even that will take some time and I can build Zerglings faster than they can send their troops. Okay, game thing doesn't work, I have to look at it in a more realistic way._

_My friends can help me gather supplies as long as I stay undiscovered. A potential and for once real alien thread will bring those guys on high alert. I haven't really thought this through when I decided to step on this thing. I'm not really a politician and they especially won't belief me I'm there to help when I start to attack countries with asshole rulers._

The Hive assured her that she was the only fitting ruler. A Larva crawled up to her and Laura picked her up, stroking the little thing on the back. She watched over to where the Drones were working and decided it was way too slow. She needed to get the hang of her abilities anyway.

So for the next hours, she carefully checked as to where her Drones wanted to build tunnels and focused her mind on the specific wall. She then closed her eyes and tried to break a segment out with her pure willpower. After a while she focused on the small cracks inside and noted it went a lot easier.

With a scream, she broke out a bunch of rocks and they all landed on the ground. She made a mental note to keep the Drones at distance. Said Drones were now busy bringing the loose rocks away, while Laura worked on the next segment. She worked through the entire night and until morning.

She checked up every now and then on her friends, but their conditions didn't change. She couldn't help but check out some memories of her friends with her abilities, but their minds were a total mess right now. Luckily the Spawning Pool (she could already hear Jake screaming: "POOL PARTY!") was finished and the production of the Queen started immediately.

It only took an hour for the Queen to finish and she appeared out of an opening of the Hatchery. The queen kind of reminded Laura of Zar'Gara, but then again, they all looked the same to her, with maybe a slight color difference. This one had the same color as her, violet, so she would be directly under her command.

"My queen, I am here to serve you." The Queen dropped a curtsy to Laura. The new Queen of Blades raised an eyebrow, but else didn't show her surprise of the queen unit speaking. It actually made things easier.

"Good." she nodded. "Your name is Arcana."

"I am honored." Oh right, even Jake mentioned it one time. For Zerg getting a name was the greatest honor you could get. Ohwell, who cares? Calling her 'queen' would be just confusing.

"Right, I want you to take care of my friends here. No infestation, at least not yet. Only help them to recover."

"Why not infesting them now, when we will infest them later on anyway?" Arcana asked.

"Because it is always good to have friends inside your enemy's territory. They may not have any military rank, I have a plan for this already, but they can tell us how the general public thinks of us Zerg and give us insights of how the humans react to our attacks."

"As you wish." The Queen gently picked up the humans and brought them inside the Hatchery. Curiously Laura followed the Queen in the rather small building, compared to Lair and Hive. In the middle was a pool of acid and on the side walls were empty chambers.

Sensing the confusion of the Queen of Blades, Arcana started explaining. "In these chambers new Queens are born. They're also used for advanced experiments on every creature you like, with the Protoss as an exception. Our creators build the Protoss in a way, corruption is impossible, except-"

"The Hybrids." Laura finished. "Those things could be a problem. They might even be the reason for the memory gap.

...

What's the last important thing you remember that happened when you were still...wherever you were?"

The Queen shook her head, while putting Jake and Raymond into the chambers. "Wait a minute." Laura held up her hand. She went over to her friends and picked up everything out of their pockets and detached their watches.

"Hmm...the clothes..." she blushed slightly.

"They won't be affected, my queen. Only during an infestation."

"Good to hear. Proceed."

With her thin arms, Arcana seemed to interact with the Hatchery somehow. Both chambers closed simultaneously and filled themselves with some kind of liquid. Arcana turned around to her Queen. "This will speed up the mutation process both are currently going through. I can over watch this process and intervene if necessary. It also allows me to push the process to a certain direction. If you're not sure now my queen, don't worry. Changes can be made even after the mutation is finished. If I may ask, my queen: What is so important about those humans?"

Laura smiled. "They're my friends."

"Friends? I'm afraid I do not know this word." Arcana was really confused right now.

"It's...kinda hard to explain when you haven't experienced friendship yourself. I can give you an explanation, but you won't be able to grasp it until you have some friends yourself.

A friend is generally someone you can rely on, someone you trust. You have fun with them in your life, they help you out in difficult situations, you help them. I guess it is really hard to grasp for you, because basically you will never be alone with the hive mind.

I can give you one example. When the Hive offered me to become the new leader, my friends were concerned I wouldn't be myself anymore. But at the same time they trusted me that I would come out as myself and not as someone who's only interested in conquering and becoming stronger.

Besides where's the fun in that?" Laura laughed. "You know, when my friends and I played Starcraft together, we always played with all three races. We always imagined what would happen if actually three groups, each group being from one fraction would actually start working together? Covering each other's weaknesses?"

Arcana closed her eyes. "You're...different from the Overmind."

"Even before Amon corrupted him?"

"Even before." Arcana confirmed.

"Speaking of before, you can't answer me how Primal Zerg Genes came into my body?" Laura could easily get the answer out of the Queen's head, but she that wasn't her style.

"No, my queen. I only see what you already saw."

"Huh..." Laura put her hand under her chin. "Okay, when we're finished here, we need to conquer as many planets as possible. I don't like the idea of something waiting for us or possibly looking for us to finish us off. Best case scenario that something thinks we're dead and we have enough time to prepare.

However, we first need to focus on this planet here. Humans are idiots. I have to know, I still think like one. But this idiocy might be just the thing we need. Minus the sushi."

Arcana raised an eyebrow.

"I hate sushi, 'kay?"


	4. Chapter 4

_**Rebirth of the Commanders**_

**Hive Cluster**

Simultaneously Raymond and Jake fell out of their chambers, gasping for air and completely confused. Unknown to them their eyes had been glowing blue and green for a few seconds.

The two looked around confused at the fleshy building they were in and their eyes rested on each other. "You *pant* alright?" Jake asked. Raymond nodded, still panting himself. The two noticed the pool of acid in front of them and instinctively crawled back, until their feet met the fleshy wall.

Slowly the two got up on their feet with their soaked clothes. "Man, is that how a chicken feels after getting out of an egg?" Jake asked. "We're not corrupted, well not from the outside." Ray remarked. "And I don't hear thousand of voices in my head, so it is safe to assume that Laura is still the same."

"Urrgh, still doesn't help my brain." his friend remarked. "Let's get the hell outta here before I drop into that pool."

The two looked a little around, before finding a way out.

"POOL PARTY!" Jake couldn't help himself. Raymond rolled his eyes and looked around. His eyes were frozen on the Zerg Queen and the Queen of Blades approaching them.

"Holy-"

"-shit!"

The two exclaimed. Laura stopped in her tracks and frowned. "Really? A super sexy alien queen is approaching you and that's all that comes out of you two?"

"What do you expect me to say? Look dat ass?!" Jake asked.

...

The three busted out into laughter, which lasted for a minute.

"Glad to see you're still yourself." Raymond smiled and so did his two friends. He noted Laura's teeth being pretty sharp. "Good to see you two are alright."

"Still, what's up with the icky stuff?" Jake asked.

"Long story short, when I woke up, I let out a psi wave and it started some kind of mutation in your brains. I found out a Queen could help me taking care of you, so I built a Spawning Pool and summoned Arcana here." She gestured with her hand towards the Queen, who nodded. The two humans nodded back out of habit.

"Arcana took care of you guys and sped up the process of your mutation. You two have been out for a day." Behind Laura the sun was setting. "Arcana installed a damper inside your brains, so even the lowest psi abilities will come slowly in a few days. She also can modify you two later, when you get the hang of your abilities and push your brains in certain directions."

"Sounds like an MMORPG." Jake commented.

"Sounds almost like Warcraft to me." Raymond countered. "Anything else?"

"No, not really." Laura sighed. "I'm getting the hang of my abilities pretty easy, but I can't do much, but make this place bigger. I can hunt animals, but sooner or later someone will catch me on camera. That's where you two come in."

Jake's face became a deadpan. "I'm not exactly a gold mine."

Laura grinned. "That's why I'm going to make first contact, when I already got a bunch of Zerglings."

"Wait, wait, wait." Raymond waved with his arms. "Have you really thought this through? It won't take long for the politicians to combine pictures with the video game."

"Yeah, but Zerg aren't exactly passive and as long as I don't attack humans, we should be fine. 'Sides, as long as nothing happens to any humans there won't be something like a military blockade. We also have democracy here and before that is given up and red alert is called out through the entire country, you two will have your own bases. Just keep me informed and everything will be fine. Uh, I'll need a new phone. Speaking off..."

She levitated all the stuff she had taken out of her friends' pockets and brought it into their hands. Their eyes were widened from the show.

"I think I'm gonna take a shower and drink my brain into submission." Jake said.

"You can have my phone in the meantime, though keep it shut. I think we'll only have time to call in the evenings, since we both have jobs and need to go the university."

"Sure thing. Just, really don't take too long or else I get bored. And you know what will happen when I get bored."

Later outside Raymond whispered to Jake. "You're SO after dat ass."

"Shut up. It's only my hormones."

"I know you good enough. This time bro, it's love."

"Yeah, right. One more comment and you can walk home."

XIII

**University Entrance**

Jake's headache went away after a goodnight sleep. He and Raymond could come up with separate excuses as to why they couldn't attend their jobs and one day missing wouldn't get them fired. Jake didn't feel any different and he certainly didn't hear any thoughts of the people around him in his head.

He took in one last breath of the fresh air, before entering. Raymond was on the other side of the campus for the first half of the day, so the two wouldn't be able to hold a conversation about their change.

"A few days and I'll start hearing voices. Oh man, my life just got totally messed up. Wonder what mom and dad will say, when they find out." He snickered at the thought.

During the lecture he asked himself, whether he should bother to even listen anymore. It didn't matter whether they would actually make it or lose in the first few weeks. No matter what, the authorities would find out about him and Raymond and enter secret laboratory. Maybe they could pull off something like Pinkie and the Brain.

XIII

**Cantina**

"'Sup?" Jake greeted Raymond and placed himself next to his friend on the table. "How was it?"

"Wasn't exactly listening, to be honest." Raymond replied, typing something into his laptop. "Here, check it out."

_Asteroid contains living Cells!_

_Astronomers baffled!_

"Well, should have expected that." Jake commented. His friend nodded. "Hopefully it won't be enough to corrupt anyone in the long run or give them some insights that would help them."

"Now it really sounds like we're up against X-COM."

Raymond grinned. "Perhaps we're. One thing's clear. Business will boom pretty soon. Scientists, nerds and whatnot will come here just for that stupid rock."

"Nerds huh? At least something we have knowledge about. But let's face it: none of us knows shit about military strategies and all that crap. I mean, we can't really rely on the overwhelm tactic." Jake gulped. "Imagine one of us going against Raynor and his Raiders."

"True, true. We still have the advantage though. The standard weapons won't do much on even the standard units. But what really should concern us is to how we secure a big area as our main operation base and how we get to the countries we want to operate. We're in the middle of Europe after all."

Jake sighed in frustration. Things really got complicated fast. How Ray could keep his calm in all of this was a mystery to him, but then again, it was probably for the better.

"I'm gonna give Laura a call. Bet she already hatched the first two lings."

XIII

**Hive Cluster**

"Relax~" Laura spoke into the phone, holding it with her telepathy. Her claws would only damage the display. "I already got it covered." She continued, while helping out the Drones with taking down walls.

_"Mind filling us in?" _she heard from the other line.

"Smuggling."

"...What? You expect us to smuggle a Drone in our backpacks or something?"

"Not we, but you're right with the Drones. I have thought about corrupting some important people, but then I realized it wouldn't give us any points in the matter of trust. I looked into the changeling strain and wanted to know why the hell they died so fast. Turns out they have nothing to get nutrients into their bodies. I'm currently redesigning the strains, but I need some essence to work with."

_"Essence?"_

_"She means we have to buy her some meat." _Hearing Ray's voice, she knew she was on loud.

"I hid my spare key behind the laundry machine in the basement on duck tape. You can use whatever money I have left there. And water my flowers please."

_"Urgh, you're going to be thrown out soon anyway, once they notice your absence."_

"Shut up grumpy. So anything wrong with your brains already?" She asked.

_"Nope."_

_"Double nope."_

"Okay." Laura trailed off a little, thinking.

_"You do realize, for Changelings we need at least a Lair?"_

"Yeah, I know that. That's why I'm creating some Zerglings right now. We'll hunt the area at night, so we don't have to rely on your wallets so much. Someone would notice sooner or later about how much meat you two are buying."

_"Yeah, but some hunters will also notice the lack of wildlife sooner or later." _Ray interjected.

"Meh, they probably already noticed the massacre I caused. Anyways, anything else?"

_"They found life on the "taxi" our friend used. A lot of important guys are coming and inspecting the thing. The city won't give the rock away, lol. Oh, by the way, the thing is here at the university. They're going to study it here, somewhere in the D building."_

"The rock isn't important. Whatever's left on that thing, it ain't dangerous. It's going to die in a few days, unless they do something about it. There's not enough creep for me to use it and they don't even know what they're looking at.

Okay, keep me updated. Oh and make sure to bring extra steaks for me and also get me something to drink."

Laura hung up and placed the phone safely away. Since Zerg needed no sleep, they were getting somewhere into extending their base. She walked towards the entrance and leaned her arm against the wall. She watched the world in front of her. She should be worried, about what happened to her, about her family, her friends, but the only thing she felt was excitement. She just couldn't wait and start, but luckily there was something to keep her at bay. The swarm was now a part of her and right now the swarm was vulnerable. It wasn't even really a "swarm", considering the numbers.

Arcana walked up next to her, claws laying over one another. "For millennia we have been at war with the Protos. And although we had the greater numbers, we remained at a stalemate. They were strong, clever, worthy opponents. And now we can't even fight against a planet full of backwoods Terrans."

"There's a little saying among Terrans: Shit just got real." Laura chuckled. "Haaaaaaaaang, this is annoying. We have all this power, BUT we have to be careful because there's something out there that defeated the Zerg. I shouldn't be worrying about it now, but it's nagging me up. If only I could relief some stress with a little fight at least."

XIII

**Johnson Law Office**

Raymond needed to get to work. He was lucky to get this job as a secretary. Good payment and most of the time the only thing he did was answering phone calls and put said calls through to his boss. Of course he was also the coffee boy, but that was endurable.

His job didn't need much focus and allowed him to let his mind wander. The phone or his boss opening the door from inside his office, brought him back to reality often enough.

_We could go underground only, at least here in this country for the time being. But this will be a challenge, not to mention we need to checkup if the ground is even solid enough for this kind of thing or if it will collapse if we dig too deep._

He looked over at the clock and sighed. A few more hours. Neither he nor Jake had the time today or tomorrow to visit Laura, which was troublesome. If none of them held back the girl, she would do something stupid.

_Heh, funny. To think that my opinion has such a great weight on the decisions of the Queen of Blades._

XIII

**Raymond's apartment**

He was half expecting to see sightings about unknown creatures on the news, but found nothing out of the ordinary. Though there was this civil war in the Ukraine and Russia had its hands in it.

Neither side was without fault here. Who shot first anyway?

"It's time to give humanity a wakeup call." He decided, not noticing the phone was floating inside his hand. The mental damper was weaker than expected.

"Jake? It's Ray. Turn on the news, I got our first target."

XIII

_"The Ukraine? Guess why not we have to start somewhere. But, what exactly are we planning to do here?"_

"This will sound a little crazy, but how about we force the humans there to work with each other and really talk? We could station troops on both sides, so military strikes would cause civil losses. We just need to strike fast enough, before any of the big guys, decides to send an army. After we've established control, we'll force them all on the table for a nice little talk."

_"Well, at least you got a plan. I don't really know what to do with my own target..."_

"You got one too?"

_"White Russia."_

The name explained everything. "Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that one."

_"I got an idea. Let's let our "dear queen" decide. Laura is the one in charge anyways. But Russia itself gives me an idea. There's lots of place and a lot of places are even uninhabited."_

"And we could use the space and the amount of wildlife in Russia to build up our own army. But it won't go without plunder and seeing as to how Russia dealt with plunderers in the past and all."

_"Welp, unlike Napoleon and the other suckers, the winter won't kill us."_

"No, no, wait. We need a backup plan. The other countries might send troops from the west side and pinch us. Plus, I think we're forgetting why we're doing this: to help humanity and not to conquer an entire planet just like this. Now that I think about it, White Russia sounds like a good idea. What have thought of?"

_"Kind of like...we bring down the bad guy, show the humans there everything good about independence, democracy and all that supposed to be good crap."_

"You really don't have a plan..."

_"I never said I have. Let me do some research first. Oh shit..."_

"What is it?"

_"I'm sitting on my PC here and just noticed for both countries we need to get at least through one other."_

Ray facepalmed. "Laura won't go the quite way, when we propose our plans to her, will she?"

_"Eeeeenope."_

XIII

**Hive Cluster**

"Chalk down another one." Laura brought the last of her prey towards back to the cave, where her Drones eagerly brought everything into the Hatchery.

"My Queen, they're about to be born." Arcana announced.

"Excellent." Laura smiled and walked over to the two cocoons. A third one just morphed itself in front of her. In a matter of seconds the first four Zerglings were born, being a bit bigger than the Drones.

The four predators looked up to Laura, awaiting her orders. "Look for anything useful for us, but avoid human contact. Tell me anyway if you spot any."

The four ran out into the night, which sadly wouldn't last that long anymore. As long as Laura could relieve some stress at night, she could stand still throughout the rest of the day. Making the cave larger became boring pretty fast. It kept her occupied, but still, she would go insane if this would go on for anytime longer.

"First contact. Well my Zerglings are here now, but I think I'll wait for one or two more days. I know I said I'd make it after the lings are ready, but now that I really think, it would be pretty dumb."

XIII

The following two days were spent for Ray and Jake in going on about their everyday lives and Laura very slowly increasing the size of her swarm. Checking the local papers, Jake and Ray informed the Queen of Blades about founds of the massacre sightings.

Of course, only blood and here and there an overlooked body part was found. Yet the entire thing was so mysterious, some theorized it were a bunch of hunters. Others thought a monster, some kind of giant feral beast was responsible for that. And who the hell came up with the Bigfoot theory? This wasn't America.

Of course one either real crazy or real smart group connected the dots to the asteroid and blamed aliens for it. It was the talk in the university, since the rock was currently stored in one of their buildings.

During the third day, Ray found time to deliver a lot of meat to Laura during the evening. Her Drones had waited for him at the spot he always placed his car.

On the fourth day, things started to get complicated. Ray and Jake had been just walking through the halls of the university, when they collapsed simultaneously. They're abilities, subtle during the past days had unlocked themselves, one being the ability to hear people's thoughts. It was so overwhelming with everyone around in the area, especially as some of them started to panic invardly.

They excused themselves rather rudely and left for Jake's home, since it was closer.

XIII

**Jake's apartment**

The two of them were just lying on the couches. Luckily the building was only three stories tall and the only other person at home was an old lady, living on the third floor. Her thoughts were so slow, it was like putting an ice pack on the two young men's heads.

"Ray, we gotta learn to shut that off." Jake panted, staring at the white ceiling.

"I know." Raymond panted back. "I know. We need to get to Laura. Some kind of permanent damper, you know, until we learn it and all."

"Agreed, but not now. I'm gonna crash into something the second I start the motor at my state. Huh! Go figure."

"What?"

"The old lady knows Merkel personally."

"You're actually listening to that?" Raymond asked.

"It's hard NOT to."

XIII

**Hive Cluster**

Laura grinned. She had totally abandoned the worker production in order to get 60 Zerglings in total. It was insane, she needed to put them outside and without the digging upgrade, someone was bound to stumble upon one sooner or later.

She only had ten Drones, who were all working their asses off in order to create more space. Jake gave his cell phone to a Drone the other day, since Ray's was empty. None of her human friends had seen the actual Zerglings yet and ooh boy, they would be surprised.

A few more Overlords were hovering above at the ceiling. It got kind of stuffy inside the cave over the past few days. The Overlords would of course stay for a little longer, being vulnerable and important for the connections.

The sun was setting yet again and her patience had run out. It was a miracle it lasted that long, really. Perhaps it had something to do with her newly developed motherly instincts for her swarm. Huh, no wonder Kerrigan called the Zerg her children.

Suddenly she felt something stirring her mind. Two all too familiar psionic signature slowly came closer to the Hive.

_Hey guys!_

_Urgh..._

_Ummph..._

_What's up?_

_Laura, just stop. _Jake muttered back.

_We have been hearing voices the entire day. _Raymond explained. _We...made a little scene at the university and now rumors are starting to spread already._

_Is that a Zergling?! _Jake exclaimed in his mind, accidentally yelling inside the minds of his friends.

_We...could need some help with THAT._

Laura chuckled. Of course her friends had no memories to give them a crash course of psionic powers. She sorted them out already, preparing to show it to her friends. Of course, Laura also had Zerg instincts, which her friends had not. The boys would have to practice a little bit.

Speaking off, the two arrived in front of the cave just before it really got dark. Laura's crash course simply was putting her hands on her friends' heads and uploading the right memories into their brains.

After a little episode of zombie disorientation, including the moans, the three each drank a beer (Jake didn't care much at this point) and sat together around, while the Zerglings roamed the woods. Arcana joined them too.

"So yeah, that's what we got." Jake finished explaining the plan to Arcana and Laura. "Russia was our focus in all the planning. However, it's probably not a very good idea to attack one of the leading military countries."

"It's just Putin is an ass." Jake stated. "My old history teacher called him the modern Caesar."

"Wish I'd have that teacher." Laura said before taking a sip. "He's actually a lot like Caesar, now that I think about it. But honestly guys, Russia is too much in my opinion." she told them. "I thought more about a more obvious country like North Korea."

"A little far away." Raymond pointed out.

"I know, I know, jeez. I was thinking more about smuggling a Drone into a ship with a special Changeling. From there on we would get to Egypt and then to all those poor southern countries. The base would be in the desert."

"The desert?" Raymond asked.

"The fuck girl? There's nothing to get."

The Queen (the unit) seemed enraged, but a small thought from Laura kept her calm. "If we put down enough Extractors, we'll be able to pull something off. Sandstorms could be a problem, but I think the Zerg are already used to this kind of thing. Char as the home planet and all."

Raymond took a huge sip and opened up his second bottle. Jake decided for something none alcoholic. Laura, well it was questionable whether she could get drunk at all with her healing abilities. She even offered Arcana a beer, which she took as an order to take it and drink it. She mimicked Laura in the process.

"We'll show presence. Well, Arcana and I will do. You two will just go on and contact me from time to time. Via mind link of course. I don't want to get tracked down."

The two humans groaned. Jake considered throwing the bottle away and taking another one with the alcohol inside.

"But that would include no more visits from us." Ray pointed out.

Laura shrugged. "I'll think of something."

Jake let his head sunk, being just tired from the entire day. "I just wanna go to an all you can eat sushi buffet and fall into a sushi coma. Mmm~ sushi coma."

"Shut. De Fuck. Up." Laura growled, her eyes glowing purple while she spoke.

Ray chuckled. "You know it's funny. Here we're, sitting around with the Queen of Blades, she being our friend, talking about changing the world, making fun here and there AND we're drinking beer."

"Pff, what do I care how a queen is supposed to behave?" Laura said and to proof her point, she finished the bottle in one sip and opened the third one with her claw nails.

"It's crazy" Jake commented, looking to the side, smiling "but then again, society didn't manage to drive the craziness out of us."

"For the crazy swarm." Laura rose her bottle.

"Cheers." All four smashed their bottles together, took a large sip and slammed the bottles to the ground (Arcana being a little off timing, since she was still learning). The new swarm had officially started its campaign to change the world into the ideals of three just out of their teens humans, who were ready to get drunk for the night.


	5. Chapter 5

_**A/N: Sorry it took so long. I was half done with the chapter and then I was out of ideas.**_

_**First contact**_

**The hills**

"Symbiotic invasion?" Ray spoke into the phone, while Jake was busy driving. "Jake is giving me this what the fuck look and seriously, what exactly do you mean by that?"

"Uh huh...

Yes...

That makes sense...

Well...

You have no idea what you're actually talking about, are you?" the man on the phone asked.

"Sure you do." Raymond deadpanned. "Yeah, see you." he shut down the phone and sighed. Chris shook his head. "Symbiotic invasion? The hell was she talking about?" Jake asked.

"I have no idea either. Anyways, she says her Zerglings are on the loose. We better get back into town, before they set up a roadblock."

"Like the police is going to react that fast. Are you going to the university today? Because I sure don't. My brain still feels like its melting."

Raymond looked straight ahead on the road. "I think I'll go. It also won't raise any more suspicion if we come back on different days, after the show we put up."

"Suit yourself." Jake shrugged. They drove now on the road next to Ground Zero, where they found all kinds of scientists around and a few people in suits.

"Well will you look at that." Jake pointed with his thump towards the crater. They even built up a ladder in order to get down into the opened cave.

"They sure are in for one hell of a surprise." Raymond nodded. The two faintly heard their voices inside their heads, but luckily the two were quickly driving away.

XIII

**The Woods**

Laura enjoyed running amongst or rather against her Zerglings. She sure hoped she would be able to put the speed upgrade on herself too. She stopped just like this on a point, where she had an overview of the area outside the woods.

A lot of hills were painting the scenery, with a beautiful dawn. Kind of unfitting for the Zerg, but for that only Blizzard could be blamed. Oh Blizzard. How would they react, once they found out the Zerg were actually a real thing now? A lot of real things, which would soon be a lot more things.

A few Zerglings joined her on watching the world around them. "Not really the dangers you guys are used to, huh?" she crawled one of her little minions, who rubbed his head at her leg in response. "Don't forget. Don't attack any farm animals or humans. The last thing we need is the humans trying to exterminate our base way too early."

The Zerglings nodded in response. "Alright, hunt for anything else that might be useful for us. Also, try to locate two more places, where we can place two more Hatcheries. Move out."

_I really could get used to this. Only downside, they'll put the city under lockdown, once they got their asses moving. Good thing we're surrounded by a lot of not habitant areas. If only there wouldn't be so fucking many villages around._

_My queen. The first Zerglings have been spotted by passing humans in cars. It is only a matter of time, until the governments will found out about our presence and take action against us._

_You know what really would be funny? If it really would be like in the game X-COM, like Jake said. But then again, it would be kind of counterproductive for us if they immediately start to create the VED, like in the game._

_The human weapon technology is not as advanced as the one of the Terrans from the Koprolu sector. It will take a lot of more shots to kill a Zergling, but they can still cripple our troops. A rocket launcher is still a dangerous weapon and we shouldn't underestimate their air forces. I cannot do much against their more advanced aircrafts. Another problem is this planet being with over 70% covered with water. We can only fight against ships from out the air._

_Then either we deal with it or change the fact we don't have water units. Anyways, if my plan works in a good amount of time, they won't be able to live without us, whether they actually want it or not. One more thing: prepare the chambers. We might get some volunteers soon. Sure hope they bring some beer with them. Being able to drink as much alcohol as you want is awesome._

Laura cut the conversation short. She was getting off topic again anyway. It was time to get out of these woods and get done with things. Too bad she still had to deal with building up her HQ, as well as giving each of her friends a base of their own. Her idea was giving them full control over their own swarms, like in an actual game. Their ZZZ games normally didn't end that well and this time they had to fight against an entire world. And Jake couldn't use his precious nukes.

_Arcana, I just remembered, how's the special virus going?_

_As expected I am confronted with quite a few problems. It may be easier for me if I had help and also an Evolutionary Chamber would certainly help my efforts._

_And we don't have the supplies for any of that stuff. I hate mineral block._

_If I may, my Queen. There's a volcanic region nearby about 35 kilometers away from the town._

_Sure is. Wasn't there very often. Jake knows is better than me. Your point?_

_If we place Extractors in this region, we will be able to gather many resources._

_Oh right. Volcanoes spitting ashes and stuff. Damn, sometimes I'm just too dumb. Still we first need supplies for a Hatchery. Still, thanks for the reminder._

Laura went away from her watching spot and started running again. She would probably run for the rest of her live all over across the planet, if there wouldn't be a force out there, which could make the Zerg extinct for good. Not to mention, she would have to dodge a lot of bullets during her run.

Laura simply enjoyed the wind rushing against her face. She really could do these for days, but she already was outside the forest. School was about to begin and the local villages would be as good as empty with the people going into the city to attend their jobs.

She herself had almost never been outside the town, so she might as well make herself familiar with the surrounding area. It didn't take long for her to come across some farm animals, which all panicked upon either seeing her or one of her Zerglings. Half of them ran so far into the next patch of woods, looking for anything that might be useful. A few were already running back to the Hatchery and the number of bio energy was slowly growing inside Laura's head.

New Drones were spawned from that energy. Laura was just walking up another hill, when suddenly a sense of danger overcame her, causing her wings to spread out, ready to kill everything in their way.

_Our forces are under attack_

Laura raised an eyebrow and looked from on Zerg to the other, until she found the source of the trouble. One of her Zerglings had been shot by a hunter. The damage was minimal. The Zergling would recover pretty quickly. She gave order to leave the human alone, while she herself decided to make a personal approach. Her Zerg kept an eye on the man, while she came closer and closer. She needed to get back to the woods, where she eventually found him at the entrance next to a car. He was slowly going backwards, looking like he would panic any second.

"Hey!" Laura called out. The Zerglings immediately walked away, going back into trying to find wild animals to kill. The hunter turned around and his eyes widened in horror as he saw Laura standing in front of him. He shakily readjusted his weapon and pointed it at Laura.

"S-Stay away!" he shouted.

"Or what? You're going to shoot me?" Laura rolled her eyes. It needed more than a few freaking siege tanks to kill the Queen of Blades. Why should she be afraid of a simple rifle?

"W-w-what are you?" he shouted.

"You remember that meteoroid?"

The man's eyes widened even more, if that was even possible at all. "I got infected with a special virus and all those creatures you've seen around are under my command. Now, I'll let it slide that you shot one of them, since you didn't know I gave order to not harm any humans."

She used her telekinesis to pull the weapon towards her. Next she crushed the weapon in half, effortless with her hand. "But next time I won't be so merciful, got it?" she growled. The human only nodded.

"Good." Laura said satisfied with the answer. "Tell anyone you wanna tell about this. We'll be all over the media anyways pretty soon. And if the authorities ask you, we're only here to hunt wild animals. As long as they don't piss me off in any way, I'll let you guys alone.

Nice car by the way." She clapped with her hand on the SUV before taking her leave. Not really a graceful performance, but it wasn't like she cared anyway.

XIII

**Jake's apartment**

"Check out the internet." Jake spoke into the phone. "I swear every time I reload youtube, there's a new video about Zerg sightings."

_"I can see it now. Wow, Laura really lets them go crazy. Did you see the break dancing Ling?"_

"Yeah, sure have. Hey what's with all the noise?"

_"Just a crowd gathered around me."_

"Everything fine with your...you know, that thing."

_"A little hard, but still bearable. I need to hang up. They start hammering on my laptop."_

"See you tomorrow." Jake hung up and rubbed his forehead. It was better with the voices, but they were still getting on his nerves, especially when he tries to take a nap. All he could do was waiting until Laura had enough supplies to provide him and Ray with their own troops.

Suddenly someone rang on his doorbell. _Another package I have to keep? Hmm, let's test this new ability._

_..._

_The cops?!_

Jake pulled off as soon as he found that out. "Okay, stay calm and open the door." he told himself. He went over and pulled the phone that was connected to the outside. "Yes?"

"Police. We want to talk to a Jake Marshall."

"Just a second."

_Stay calm._

He pressed the green button, opening the door downstairs. Jake opened the door to his own apartment, seeing two officers walking upstairs. "Can I help you somehow?"

"We hope you can." The first one spoke up. He took out a picture and showed it Jake. "That's Laura. What about her? Did she try to steal a plain again? I told her to stop with the white stuff." he joked.

"Mr. Marshall, this is no laughing matter. Her parents called us. They told us you're a friend with this girl. She's been missing for a few days."

"Missing?" _I'm such a bad actor. _"No wonder she wasn't online the past few days. Just thought she was sick." _And the Oscar for the worst actor goes tooooo...ME._

The two policemen gave each other a glance.

_They're so NOT onto me. Har, har, sarcasm._

"Mr. Marshall, do you have any idea where she might be?"

Jake shrugged. "She's a city girl. It's not like we're childhood friends. I know she lived in Cologne before coming here. The only thing I can give you guys is where she normally works."

"That's not necessary. We already know." The second one spoke up. "Did she have any enemies?"

Jake thought about it. "Not that I know off. By now she has a bunch of ex-boyfriends and a bunch of girls who hate her for always getting the good looking guys, although she is a gamer girl."

"Gamer girl?"

"You know, she likes playing video games and do other nerdy stuff." Jake calmed down with each question.

"You're taking this pretty lightly with your friend missing."

_ARRGH!_

"Just don't feel so well today. 'Sides, this is Laura we're talking about. The girl is a little nuts and does a little nutty stuff every now and then. Takes a nuke to kill her. Jokes aside, she just might have forgotten to call her family. You can ask them. The time my friend, she and I were on a little trip, we also got picked up by the police, because Laura forgot to tell them that she was away for two weeks. I'll get worried, when she's missing for a month."

The policemen gave each other another short glance, before the first one nodded. "Thank you Mr. Marshall." He took out a card. "If you remember anything or she goes into contact with you, please give us a call."

"Will do (so NOT)."

The men left and Jake had trouble not to slam the door shut. He leaned against the wall and took in some deep breaths, before extending his psyche again.

_"He's definitely hiding something."_

_"Do you think he know where the girl is?"_

_"I know that he knows SOMETHING."_

"Shit..." Jake quickly dialed the first number.

"Ray, the cops were here. They know I was lying to them about Laura. They might go to you too." Jake spoke on the voicemail.

XIII

Raymond had received the message, while he had been in a lecture and was listening to it on the way to the bus station. An unusual great amount of police cars was on the road by now. The reason was pretty easily explained: Laura was bored. So she had sent a Zergling into the city, which was doing nothing more, than running around, scouting and basically scaring the shit out of everyone who saw it. Not to mention the damage it did by jumping on cars or throwing trash cans and similar things out of its way.

The downside was, the busses were pretty late and there was a lot of traffic downtown. Not to mention the voices of the slightly tense people were hammering on his mind.

After finally managing to get back at home, first thing he did was getting an aspirin before anything else. He prepared himself a decent meal, because unlike his two friends he actually knows how to cook and preferred home made over fast food.

Finally he came to his living room and turned on the news.

"As of now, officials have refused to make a statement to the sightings of those creatures." The reporter tapped something on her tablet. By now, they all used these things instead of the good old papers. One point for the trees.

"One fact that cannot be denied anymore, is that those creatures resemble the spitting image of creatures from a video game, making many belief this is some kind of campaign-"

Someone was knocking at the door. Raymond turned off the volume and listened to the voices outside.

_Police. I thought they had something better to do, than looking for missing teenagers. Unless they already connected the dots._

Raymond opened the door. "Hello officers. I just made some coffee. Come in, I've already expecting you."

"You have?" One of them asked. "Jake told me you might come here. My dad always said you have to be good for your guests and it's almost written inside my DNA by now." He replied, while letting them in.

"Please, make yourself comfortable. I'll be right back."

It was not the weirdest thing the two officers have experienced, so the two placed themselves on the couch and looked at the muted television. One of them pointed at the program. "Can you belief this crap? Someone's making a mountain over a molehill."

"More like a Brutalisk over a Zergling." Raymond entered the living room with three cups of coffee, milk and sugar. He was the born waiter.

"Pardon?"

"Oh nothing." Ray chuckled. "It's just these "creatures" resemble creatures from a video game I play."

"Mhm. Anyways, that's not what we're here for. We're looking for your friend. Since you already know she is missing, do you have any idea where she could be?" A sly smile formed on Ray's smile. "By the time I haven't seen her, I wouldn't be surprised if she'd have ended up in New York or Las Vegas." He shook his head and took a sip from his coffee.

"She's crazy alright. The only thing I could really think of is that she is a city girl and in conclusion she would be most likely in a city. I can't think of anyone who would want to harm her. A few girls are jealous because of her good looks, but that's hardly a motive, right?"

One officer spoke up. "When was the last time you saw her?"

Ray thought about it. "Let me see..."

_They can easily check up her phone calls, so they will know that she called us._

"The day after the three of us ended in that crater. She called us over and Jake and I stayed overnight. We had a little fun, something to drink and looked at the photos we took from that meteoroid."

"I see..." the other officer spoke. Ray was a better liar than Jake and kept his face through the entire conversation. Raymond answered a few more standard questions, before the officers left, telling him to call them if he might recall something he forgot to tell them.

XIII

**The Woods**

The military reacted quicker than Laura expected they would be, but actually that was to be expected. She was just glad she had yet to see any American fighter jets in the air. Of course the Americans would need to ask the local government first or rather the other way around, the locals asking for help. Unless she of course destroyed the local airbase.

_Not very local, being 50 km away. Man, I'm glad Jake is so interested in this whole military business. Pff, probably only because for his fanfictions._

_My Queen, the Terrans have started approaching our relative position. They haven't found our base, but our scouts report they're searching in a parameter. Helicopters are in the sky, giving the ground troops information._

_These guys move fast. Heh, guess they're not as dump as I thought. Let's pull our troops together. I'm pretty sure with focus fire they can take out a Zergling._

_Should we engage the Terrans?_

_Nope. Not now. Focus on getting supplies, but be careful about the suckers. And if they shoot...I got a plan._

Laura looked in the distance where her hometown was located. These military types actually acted reasonable. She soon realized she and her friends had been looking at it in an all too naive way. They couldn't just expect to walk around and attack _only evil nations._

Nice thoughts and all, but the time would come they would have the entire world against them. Of course they would hold back and most likely force surrender if possible. But still, it went against Laura's conscious to do this. Not that she wouldn't do it.

"No one said it would be easy. I guess I better prepare for my first mission." She mumbled to herself, before heading back towards the cave. It was the only place where she could fully focus on one her servants and look through their eyes.

An over watching Zergling looked down at the group of humans, which were slowly making progress. Some of them were riding on jeeps; some even were driving on the street. They also avoided going over farm fields. They did now, but they wouldn't once the fighting would start.

Laura planned on avoiding that until she had anti air and she was making very slow progress with the restrictions she put upon herself. Why did she have to follow the tech tree anyway? Morphing a Lair wasn't exactly cheep with the minimal resources she had.

At least there was good news: the humans approached with a very small strike force, one that could be fought back AKA slaughtered. The downside of course would be the humans becoming more aggressive really fast.

Laura looked at some of the weapons they were carrying. Ray and Jake would need to learn how to wield some of those. The question was: what was best for their personal style?

_Note: break into an armory and get some guns._

"I always wanted to try a rocket launcher." Laura mumbled while opening her eyes. "Or I could try a sniper like Kerrigan. Or both." she shrugged before putting her hand under a chin. The humans didn't know where exactly she was, but that would change soon enough. There was almost nothing she could do against enemy flyers or satellites.

_Oh yeah, so apparently I have to play with enemy having full vision cheat activated. At least against USA, that's for sure. Wonder if the Overlords could do something against them? Baneling bombers, duh. But then neither Jack nor Ray would be able to pull anything useful out. Okay, internet would be still there, but for how long? In case of crisis it might just be shut down._

Laura levitated up the cell phone. Although she would prefer telepathic contact, she just didn't have the juice at the moment to pull it off. The risks weren't ultimately high, but there. This would probably be the last phone call she would make in a really long time.

...

...

_"Yes?"_

"Sup Jake, how's it going?"

_"Headache. Mostly headache. Oh and the cops were here. Your family is missing you."_

Laura felt like someone just stabbed her heart. That's right! She still had a family out there. A family, which would grow worried sick overtime. And what about when they find out what have become of her?

_"Laura? Still there?"_

"Y-yeah. Sorry, spaced out."

_"Worried aren't ya?_

_..._

_Should I tell them? When it is out?"_

_Jeez, he just doesn't know how to be sensitive. Well at least he tries._

"No. I'd rather talk to them face to face. I...never mind. There's something else going on here."

_"I don't like the sound of it."_

"Yeah. Looks like I overdid it a little with my teasing and now there's the army out there. They're scouting the area with helicopters and some ground troops. Infantry, jeeps and stuff."

_"That's...not so good." _She could practically see her friend frowning. _"Are you going in?"_

"No, not yet anyways. I don't really want to do anything to them, but if they attack then I can't just ignore it. In case fighting is unavoidable, I want to have Hydras. Huh, I just got enough to morph a Lair. But I need more supplies. Can you please get some? I try to find a safe location for the trade."

_"...Alright. I already know something."_

"You do?"

_"There's another way towards the woods. I'll have to take the long way over the highway, but I can be on the other side of the woods by tonight."_

"You can?"

_"I know a way around. And google maps says there is a road there. Just don't let them know where the hive cluster is! If they close off the area, I can't get you anything."_

"Will do. Thanks, you're a bro."

_"You owe me. I won't get enough sleep tonight thanks to you again."_

"Suck it up." Laura said playfully before hanging up. Now she needed to give Ray a call and inform him about what was about to happen. Afterwards she'd have to give the army boys a false lead. Possible fights weren't out of the question anymore.


	6. Chapter 6

_**A/N: I hope I got the first battle done rather well. It is short I gotta admit and in my opinion the worst chapter so far.**_

**The start of the conflict**

**BlackQueen vs. WTD 41**

**Zerg vs Terrans**

_Strange reports came in the entire morning about oversized insect creatures. Video footage and multiple witness reports indicate this is not some kind of joke. One of Cornel Meyer's soldiers identified the creatures as Zerglings from a game called Star Craft. Despite the, to put it bluntly, sheer craziness of the situation, authorities already gave Cornel Meyer the order to send his troops and take care of the situation. Main objectives are to identity the alien source, if it really exists, keep the people from panicking and only if really necessary, use lethal force against the "threat"._

_Due to the popularity of the game Star Craft, it is only a matter of time until fans of the game try to get to see the Zerg for real. The game indicates the Zerg are lead by a higher authority, known as either the "Overmind" or "The Queen of Blades". Negotiations are not out of question._

**WTD stands for ****Wehrtechnische Dienststelle für Kraftfahrzeuge, ****which means, roughly translated "Defensive Place for Vehicles". Poor choice of words on my side, sorry and xd. WTD 41 is the military bases name near the place I live. I figured for my first chapters I would use a place I know best, which is my home. I wasn't sure until now, but the first chapters officially take place in Germany. Not exactly the best starting point, considering the surrounding nations, not to mention we really do have an American Air Base still active left from the cold war.**

**I'm sorry if the reactions from the multiple governments will not be very accurate, but I'll give my best.**

**Okay, a few last things before the mission starts. The name of the chapter can also be considered the name of the mission. I'll try to think of better ones. Situation is like this: since we humans are not complete fools, they eventually noticed they were lurked somewhere and took position on a high hill. Almost all of Laura's troops are hidden inside a forest on an opposite hill, but without the bury upgrade it only does so much against watchers from the air.**

**Let's see how things play out.**

**The hills**

Laura leaned herself against a tree, trying to think of every possible scenario the humans could attack them. At the same time she felt a little anxious, leaving her small hive cluster nearly defensless.

She wondered as to how effective the weapons would be against her Zerg the humans were using, but wondering wouldn't bring her anywhere. Only a fight would show just how effective the weapons would be. But the fight just wasn't starting.

They had been more or less staring at each other for over an hour without any of the parties moving even an inch. Just, waiting wasn't exactly the best strategy Laura could go with at the moment. Every wasted moment the humans could get reinforcements. On the other hand, attacking from the front would be suicide and aside from that, Laura didn't plan on attacking without being provoked. Maybe this was still possible to solve without conflict?

"Yeah right. Oh well, let's see how they'll react, when I show up?" She walked out of the woods without any kind of escort. The downside of that of course was that she didn't know her own limits at the time. Before she could make a final decision, the humans already made their move. Helicopters approached their side of the battlefield, a total of only 6. Raising an eyebrow, Laura ordered her Zerglings to stay alert, while she scanned the pilots with her own mind.

...

...

_Oh, SHIT! Everyone, get away!_

She didn't realize that the pilots were hearing her too and five of them temporarily lost control over their helicopters for a few seconds. They were planning on throwing grenades from above, both lethal and stun grenades, in order to get the Zerg out of their hiding place.

"Not with me, bastards."

Seeing as how she had been able to distract the pilots, she would try out her little more lethal powers. Since time was short, she randomly chose one of two nearest helicopters and connected her mind with one of the pilots and started...yeah, she had never done that.

Her mind was racing on how to do this, when she felt the guidance of her Zerg Queen in her mind. Except for an explanation that would have taken too long, she...it was like guiding someone's hand as to how to handle something, like a tool. As for Laura, Arcana showed the inexperienced Queen of Blades as to how to put pressure on someone's brain to cause a quick and very big headache, which can also be deadly given time. Time that wasn't there, but the helicopters made up to the deadliness of the situation.

The pilot lost control over his flyer, because he held his head with both hands and his jerking somehow caused his leg to hit the control stick, which in return caused the entire helicopter to turn left and hit the other one. No one knows why they were flying so near to each other or even at the same height. The truth is the author just needed an excuse to throw in a double kill. (Not counting everyone inside, btw).

Both flying vehicles immediately came down, one bursting out in flames in the process. Ignoring the crash, Laura tried to get another one, as her Zerglings at the same time were splitting up and getting away on the other side of the hill. Seeing as the Zerg came out on the other side of the woods, the humans stopped their attack and were probably communicating with their commanding officer as to what to do. One of the pilots flew over the crashing side, trying to look for survivors, yet so far no one ran out of the wreckages.

_Feel the pain._

The pilot screamed all of the sudden and started blabbering about voices in his head, until he begged whoever talked to him to stop. The crew was keeping him restraint, while the co-pilot had taken over the actual flying part.

_Arcana, I need to know how to control them._

_My queen, I'm afraid there is no time. One of the terrans has spotted you and they're readying to attack you._

Indeed, the helicopters were flying sideways and opening their doors, revealing soldiers who took aim at her.

_It seems they already know about the amount of your strength from what I was able to gather._

_Guess that was to be expected. Oh, oh, we gotta talk later._

Laura jumped deeper into the woods, as the soldiers opened fire on her. It sounded a little different from what she was used in video games, she noted to herself as she was running. At the same time she ordered her lings to get together in two groups and attack the enemy troops from two sides. The helicopters couldn't really track her down, but they started randomly throwing grenades into the small woods, trying to get a hit on her.

_Would be nice to have this lightning attack thing now. _She thought to herself as she was taking cover behind some trees, while explosions occurred every here and there. Laura weighed her options a bit and it seemed the best way to deal with this situation was to wait until they were out of grenades. Considering they only wanted to get the Zerg out of their hiding place this shouldn't take too long. A rather unsettling thought crossed Laura's mind, namely that she had no problem killing every soldier stationed in this region, actually she was looking forward to it. It was an unnerving thought and it was not the first time she felt that way, but now was seriously not the time thinking about morality.

In the meantime the humans took defensive positions against the approaching Zerg. WTD 41 was only a small base, thus resulting in the humans being outnumbered. Still they had the higher ground and long ranged weapons. To their horror, the humans noticed that as long as they didn't hit the weak spots of the Zerglings (I think it would be either the face or their stomachs), their weapons didn't do much damage on the chitin armor of the oversized insects. Sadly they weren't allowed to bring any rocket launchers (we Germans CAN be THAT reluctant in using weapons) into the mission or they might have done some serious damage.

The firs Zerglings jumped and put their teeth into the flesh of their victims. Screams of agony could be heard as the war was officially started and from there on out was unavoidable. It wasn't long until every ling was on that hill, some of them already lying on the ground, dead.

However, the humans of WTD 41 had now lost their advantage and were slaughtered by one after another. The helicopters finally came back and the soldiers inside started shooting down at the lings. Laura herself was running back with her inhuman speed, being the only one capable of shooting down air units.

As soon as she was on the hill, she could see how the battle was going. The foot soldiers were falling back, shooting everything on sight. Some of them used the jeeps they brought with them were used by them in order to get away. They were still shooting, though.

_This is annoying. As long as the helicopters are in the air, we could actually lose the battle!_

Laura also got a chance to see what her new armor could withstand, as bullets got repelled by contact with her skin. At least with the current rifles they were carrying they had a hard time harming her. While she was thinking as to how to get rid of the annoying fliers, she herself engaged the battle by cutting down a soldier with her bone wing. The good thing about being a Zerg was that multitasking became more than just second nature to Laura. She could slice up people, while at the same time thinking about the best way to get rid of the helicopters.

_My Queen. _Arcana spoke to Laura via their mind link. _Please remember that your armor can only endure so much without proper growth. Your birth was rather hasty after all._

_Someone could have told me that earlier. _Laura replied annoyed, while grabbing multiple rifles with her telekinesis and throwing them behind her. She then shot the poor dudes with her fingernails and sadly I couldn't come up with a joke for that particular matter. I'm a little messed up, in case you didn't know. And I'm trying to describe this battle as interesting as possible, but sadly, the only dangerous things left on the field were the helicopters. Every food soldier had either already left or died or was severely injured.

The choppers shot down another few of her Zerglings, when Laura decided to hack herself in another pilots mind and gave him a full doze of pain. But didn't do really much, except making the heli flying in mid-air for a few seconds until the co-pilot took over. At this Laura got really mad. She was the strongest being on earth, probably the entire Milky Way, and she couldn't take down three helicopters?

Feeling the anger, Laura grabbed after the helicopter with her mind, like she did with the weapons earlier. Certainly the flying vehicle weighed much more than a bunch of weapons, but her anger was enough to make up for that. Not only was her pride hurt, but the Zerg were practically her children now. Have you guys ever seen a mad mother? You DON'T want to, word of advice.

Ignoring the small wounds she was slowly but surely getting, she used all the strength of her mind and crashed the thing into the ground. Not even bothering to see if anyone survived, since her Zerglings would take care of any possible survivor, she redirected her mind towards the second one and redid the process. Since that thing was way higher into the air, she had some problems as the pilot struggled keeping his machine in the air. In the end Laura was able to pull the thing down and let it crash into the side of the hill. Poor cow by the way.

Secretly exhausted, the leader of the swarm prepared herself to take down the last one, only to notice that it took off towards their base. The battle was over. Laura gave order for every ling to stop at what he was doing and looked around the battlefield. Zerglings were lying on the ground, but so were even more humans. The smell of blood and whatever was inside the systems of the Zerg filled her nose. "Wow." she said with no emotion in her voice. "I...should be sad. I didn't want...whatever. No use reminiscing about the What Ifs. Let's...huh?"

A sudden movement caught her attention. One of the soldiers was still alive and aiming his weapon at her head. "Leave him be." Laura ordered her Zerglings. The next moment she sent his weapon flying and approached him. He had been bitten on his leg and was losing blood. The poor man started whimpering as she stood above him. The queen knew a thing or two about first aid and she knew that soldiers had practically everything stuffed in their backpacks. So while two lings secured him, Laura searched for everything she needed, but before she started aiding him, she took his walkie-talkie and used it.

"Today was unnecessary." she spoke in, not letting go of the button. "I knew you planned on attacking us with those helicopters. Some of you might already know about my mind reading abilities, so none of you can say I didn't act on self defense." She made a little pause. "Today I have been holding back. Next time I won't be so merciful. There's an easy way to avoid something like this happening again. You leave me alone and I let you alone. By the way, you left a survivor here."

Laura threw the thing away and started ripping the clothes apart in order to get a good look at the wound. "Wh-what are you doing?" the soldier stammered, struggling.

"*sigh*. Knock him out."

One of the lings head butted him and lights out for the man. The wound was deep, as to be expected from a Zergling bite, but not deep enough for the leg being needed to be cut off. Laura tried to remember all her knowledge about first aid, while wrapping the bandages around the leg of the man. She was done after a few minutes.

"Let's leave. We take a little detour, so they have a harder time finding our home."

XIII

**Ray's home**

The TV was running once again with a life report about the remnants of the battlefield. The military already had told all helicopters to get down, at least from the report stations, so a loop was running in the background of the studio.

The city was in fear now. Everyone Raymond had met today was on edge. No one had been really listening to the professors today after the news were out about the battle between aliens or the Zerg as now everyone knew and the soldiers of the nearby barracks.

Ray kept a look on all forums he thought were relevant. Two of them had already collapsed for a short amount of time, but were now back online. "Oh Laura, if you don't come up with a plan soon, I'm afraid it is over rather sooner than later."

His cell phone rang. He and Jake bought themselves some throwaway cell phones, since Laura kept borrowing their own phones. "Sorry to bother you." Jake came from the other line "But I lost the paper with your number."

"What?! How?!"

"It fell down the drain after I got tackled by a dog."

_Oh yeah, Jake has a thing for animals. Most of them really like him for some reason._

"It's 6809."

"Thanks bro. I guess I better get everything for...the barbecue. Hey, what's the damage anyway?"

"I don't know." Ray replied looking over to his TV. "The man in charge, a colonel Meyer, didn't give out any details. He just said, yes there had been losses, like he could cover that up, and that they will be doing everything they can to stop the thread. That's it. Oh, almost forgot, they plan on locking down a certain area around the hills. Although..." he trailed off.

"Yeah, they don't even know where the cluster is. Not to mention a lot of villages will be as good as isolated." Jake mentioned. "I know a few other routes than the main one, but...the dude is pushing his luck a little. People won't respond all too well in case they do get isolated. What about politics?"

"There has yet to be made an official statement. Merkel is coming back right now, but most likely she'll only say something tomorrow. As for the other ministers, a press conference is fully prepared. They're just waiting for them at the moment to show up."

"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow I guess. Keep an eye on the box for me."

"Will do. See you around."

XIII

Jake hung up. Raymond had given him his bank card, so Jake could actually spare his own account for once. He was walking inside the supermarket, mostly strolling around and enjoying the cool air inside the store. Since he wasn't getting much sleep anyway, he might as well try to relax. Unfortunately, his thoughts drifted off to what happened today. He shook his head multiple times, but couldn't help but feel uneasy about the situation.

He was worried Laura might turn into a real second Queen of Blades.

_What are you thinking, dude?! You haven't heard her side of the story yet. Urrgh, but that won't count much for the rest, even if somebody would be screwed up enough to try and ask her._

The cashier lady looked quite surprised as Jake showed up with the rest of meat their refrigerators and freezers had to offer, but didn't ask any questions. Instead, they took quite a long time getting everything under the scanner, since Jake didn't trouble himself with as to how much he had of each product. It took them a total of fifteen minutes to count everything and get the paying done.

Afterwards he still had to put everything in the trunk of his car. Luckily he didn't need to worry of keeping it cool, since it would be used pretty soon anyway. Now he needed to use his navigation system, which sadly hadn't been updated in quite some time. So putting some rock music into the CD-player, he hoped he would find the way soon. Knowing his navigational skills, this would take a while.

XIII

_He sure is taking his time. Am I even on the right road? _Laura thought to herself. She had to get treated by her Queen Unit earlier, who also reassured her that her armor would adapt really soon and finally be completed. As for her psi-powers, they had started some training in order to speed up the process of developing them.

But at the moment, Laura wanted to have those damn Hydralisks. She pushed her Zerglings to their limits, so they would hunt down enough animals for the Hydralisk Den. The poor dudes were now resting after having had to run so far and for so long away from the creep area which kept them up. There had been no more incidence so far, but Laura also didn't dare into sending a scouting party right now, not wanting to appear anymore aggressive. Hopefully Jake would come with some answers.

One of the Lings that were not back at home suddenly spotted his car a little off from where Laura currently was on a totally different road. A little angry about that fact, Laura ran as fast as possible towards the location and arrived there within 12 minutes. Jake was already unloading his stuff and waited for the Drones to arrive.

It was pretty dark, so Laura used the moment to sneak up on him and tapped him on his shoulder.

"WHOA! Don't scare me like that! You gave me a heart attack."

"Yeah right, don't be so overdramatic." Laura smirked in return.

"Yeah..." the boy calmed down after a few seconds. "So where are the drones?"

"They're on their way. You know, they're not as fast as I am. Thanks by the way and sorry for the trouble."

"Speaking of trouble, what was that all about today? You're alright, right?" he asked. "Yeah, I'm fine. I only noticed after the battle all these little cuts I had gotten from the rifles. As it turned out, my skin needs a little bit more time to be fully adapted and even then, in theory, you can kill me with like ten million bullets of that small caliber."

"Uh huh. Welp, good to see you're alright, but what actually happened? The news isn't exactly saying anything and according to Ray the internet is bursting with rumors and "prophecies" about judgment day. Heck, the first crazy shit-heads have already declared that they want to be infested."

Laura raised an amused eyebrow after this statement. "Too bad we found the larva. And the posts for my right and left hand are already taken. I just tell them they can't become commanders after they're transformed. They'll understand it." she winked.

The drones finally arrived and Jake and Laura helped them getting the stuff on their backs. "You still haven't told me how it came to the actual fight."

The girl sighed. "I lured them away from the cluster, just like you said I should. It worked for some time, but eventually they wouldn't come anymore. We were besieging each other more or less, waiting for the other party to make a move. Just when I thought I might be able to talk to them, they send their helicopters. I connected my mind to one of their pilots and found out they had the task of driving us out of the woods, as if we were just some animals. I used my psi abilities on the one pilot and somehow caused him to crash into another heli. And then, well, attacked from two sides and I took care of the fliers. Minimal losses on my side."

"Oh dude." the boy sighed after hearing the story. "What's done is done, I guess. Before I forget, you should probably expand your army as fast as you can. They plan on locking down a certain area, although we have no idea where exactly and how big it is going to be."

"Hmm." Laura put a hand under her chin, thinking. "The only thing I really can do is expending my army. I also thought about relocating the main base somewhere safer."

"You're on T2. Doesn't that mean you can build Infestors?"

An evil grin appeared on the young queen's face after she heard the question. A plan started forming in her head, an evil plan.

_Why did I say anything? _Jake thought to himself.


End file.
